Dark Coffee
by Lucinda
Summary: Sequel to Coffee & Thoughts.  How will Angelus handle Willow?  AU during season 2.
1. Dark Coffee

Author: Lucinda  
  
story # 1 in Dark Coffee series, which is a sequel to Coffee & Thoughts.  
  
rating: pg/pg13  
  
Willow/Angel friendship, mention of B/A   
  
Disclaimer: I own nobody from BtVS.  
  
Distribution: Bite Me, please?, WillAngel, WWW, WLS, NHA, Soulmates others   
  
please ask  
  
Set season 2, moving into AU IMMEDIATELY after Angel lost his soul.  
  
Angelus ran his hand through his hair, trying to decide if this was actually worth it. Was it worth keeping his - keeping Angel's regular coffee meetings with Willow? Willow was a good friend to Buffy, and the sooner that he could distance himself from that mistake the better. But she didn't know that he wasn't that brooding lump, Angel. Could he go through with it? And why did he want to anyhow?  
  
Because she looked at him as a person, saw both good and bad in him, and accepted that it was how he was. Because she could make him smile, and had felt guilty about wanting to hit Xander with a shovel. Because she'd known that even as Angel, he'd cared about his Childer.  
  
Willow had become Angel's friend. It was the only thing that his souled self had done that he could even remotely consider being jealous over. A friendship with a mortal girl.  
  
Glancing down at himself, he wondered if she'd believe that he was Angel. The deep red velvet shirt, the black jeans... maybe. She's be certain to suspect something if he wore the leather pants. But he just might be able to pull it off, except for all the brooding. He might be able to look suitably miserable if he remembered his soul's obsession with Buffy...  
  
He meandered into the coffee house, ordering two cups of coffee at the counter. One that had a hint of raspberry, and the other a dark Colombian brew. Wrapping one hand around each mug, he smiled a bit as he scanned the room for Willow. The door opened, and she came in, looking slightly windblown, as if she'd been rushing. Smiling, he raised one cup, in hopes that she would see him.  
  
Apparently, she did. With a small wave and a grin, she headed towards the back of the room, for one of the tables in the area that she normally preferred. They were slightly darker, a bit out of the way, and more private. Sliding into one chair, she looked up, just as he was arriving. "Hey Angel. Oh, what coffee do we have tonight?"  
  
"Raspberry, which is one of the flavors of the day. Since you have that raspberry lotion, I thought you might like it. And a basic dark coffee for me." He smiled a little as he slid the cup over to her, watching as she added sugar and cream.  
  
"Thanks." She had a tired look in her eyes, and sighed. "Caffeine is a blessing from heaven."  
  
"I thought you weren't supposed to have too much? Something about getting hyper?" He teased her a little, trying to figure out why she looked so worn down. Had things been that eventful lately?  
  
One hand waved towards the wall. "I doubt I'd make it all the way up to hyper. I'm trying to use this as a sleep substitute." She sipped at the coffee, her eyes half closed as she tested the flavor. "Mmmm. I like the raspberry. What happened with you and Buffy?"  
  
Angelus winced, wondering just what she'd heard. Did she know that something had changed, that his soul was gone? "What do you mean?"  
  
"Oh, you can't fool me, Angel. You couldn't possibly have not noticed that the whatever with you and Buffy changed, and seems to have... well, fallen. Buffy's been all confused and frustrated, and talking to me a lot." Willow blushed a bit, and looked at her cup. "Something about... umm... she said things looked really good after the party, and then you were just... not there."  
  
The tension inside of him eased a little. "Part of that was me trying to take care of the Judge. I got the parts... Sent away from Sunnydale." He remembered that argument with Spike and Dru, about the folly of destroying their meal supply. Spike had been on his side as soon as he'd figured out that their Sire was back, Dru had pouted and whined until he'd mentioned the plan to send an arm to the Watcher's Council and the way it had tried to choke Buffy.  
  
"That's been taken care of? Oh good." Willow smiled a little, resting her chin on her hand. "We've been trying to figure out how to defeat him. The whole 'no weapon forged by man' thing sort of complicates things. Cordy asked if that would include forged by a woman, and Xander had suggested a rocket launcher."  
  
"A rocket launcher?" He sat a bit straighter, wondering how Xander had arrived at such an idea. Then he started to wonder if it would work. Had he underestimated the boy? "That's a disturbing image. But no, the parts have been separated again."  
  
"What about the more personal stuff?" Willow looked at him, sipping from her cup.  
  
Buying a bit of time, he took a drink from his own mug, feeling the warmth flow through him. "Me and Buffy... It wouldn't work. Can't work. I wanted to think that it could, but..."  
  
"But?" Her voice was soft, and she was looking at him with curiosity.  
  
Angelus sighed, not certain how to explain without mentioning the soul's deluded obsession. "I'm a vampire, Willow."  
  
"Yes..." She had a small frown now, and looked at him, one eyebrow raised slightly. "I do know that. But what does that have to do with... I mean, it didn't seem to be stopping things before, so what... I mean, what changed things?"  
  
Pausing to look around to see if anyone else was listening, he decided that he could try to avoid the soul issue if he could embarrass her enough with the sexual aspects. "When vampires are... when vampires have sex, there's biting involved. It's too much of a part of who and what we are to ignore. It doesn't have to be intended to hurt, but... It's part of us. Part of being a vampire. And Buffy... she wouldn't... couldn't let me be that, be what I am. She's unwilling to accept all of me, unwilling to even try to help work out something that will... I wasn't going to hurt her."  
  
Willow's face was almost as red as her hair, and her eyes were incredibly wide. "Ohhh... Um, she didn't... I mean... that's... a lot more than I was expecting you to mention. And very personal. So, umm... if there's biting, does that mean that... does it have to draw blood for it to... umm... be satisfying? oh, I can't believe that I'm even asking that... just ignore me while I die of embarrassment over here..."  
  
Part of him was glad that she seemed willing to let the matter of Angel and Buffy drop. Another part was just fascinated by the fact that she could even blush that much - all that blood rushing to her face. Her curiosity was not quite unexpected, but still interesting and amusing. "That all depends on how things were going before the biting. Sometimes, it's enough to just nibble, others are a bit... more, and only blood will... actually, I don't think I should go on. If you blush any more..."  
  
"uuurrmm." She was staring at her mug. "It's a lot... very personal, and I feel like I'm prying."  
  
"So, what's up with the guy that you were standing with for Buffy's party?" Angelus decided to change the subject.  
  
"That's Oz." Willow had a bit of a smile as she thought about him. "He's in a band, and a senior this year. And he asked me to go out with him. Someone's actually interested in me... for something other than school work."  
  
Chuckling, he sipped again at his coffee. "Just as long as he isn't too pushy. I don't want some guy in a band to think that he can just show a little interest and get... anything and everything from you."  
  
For a moment, Willow just stared at him. "You just... that's a protective friend thing to say."  
  
He tried to figure out how to respond to that as she sat there, a smile spreading over her face as he sputtered. Finally, he managed a very weak sounding response. "Well, you are my friend. Maybe the only one, and I don't... I don't want you hurt."  
  
"Thanks, Angel." Willow smiled at him, her eyes twinkling with amusement.  
  
end Dark Coffee 1. 


	2. A Bitter Taste

Author: Lucinda

story # 2 in Dark Coffee series, which is a sequel to Coffee & Thoughts.

rating: pg/pg13

Willow/Angel friendship, mention of past-tense B/A, slight mentions of W/Oz, Buffy/Scott, Xander/Cordelia.

Disclaimer: I own nobody from BtVS.

Distribution: Bite Me, please?, WillAngel, WWW, WLS, NHA, Soulmates others please ask

Set season 2, moving into AU IMMEDIATELY after Angel lost his soul.

thank you's to Gabrielle, who took the time to check through and offer a few last minute suggestions on a couple words here and there. It means a lot to me.

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Willow stared at the pages of her history book, thinking about her coffee meeting with Angel. It wasn't a date, not even a pseudo-date, even if he had broken up with Buffy. They were friends. But still... Something had been different this week.

Angel had been different this week. She couldn't explain it, but there had been a dozen tiny things that just seemed a bit unusual. He'd been more open, discussing things that she'd only heard him hint at before. He'd smiled a couple of times, and had seemed more at ease with himself. It all added up to something being different.

But he was still Angel, still her friend. Right?

Of course he was still Angel. Of course he was still her friend. He'd listened to her ramble hopefully about Oz, and talked for a while with her about the sort of little things that really didn't mean much more than that he was taking the time to listen to her. Only a friend would do that for her.

Maybe it was just that dating Buffy had been bad for him? The part of her that was Buffy's friend felt guilty for thinking that way, wanting to offer comfort to the Slayer who was one of the few friends Willow had ever had. But really, a Slayer and a vampire didn't make much sense. He was handsome, and mysterious, and nice, but... If he and Buffy didn't talk about things, and couldn't compromise, and only focused on this very moment, how could they have something that lasted? They kept getting all jealous and possessive, and then defensive and angry, and it was just... bad.

Angel seemed to be getting over the break-up a lot faster than Buffy though. Or maybe he was just hiding the pain better? Two hundred and forty years could teach you a lot about hiding your feelings.

Shaking her head, Willow gathered her books, managing not to jump when the bell rang, announcing the end of the school day. Opening the door from the library, she glanced out, looking for Oz. Maybe they could have coffee and talk?

But she didn't see Oz. She saw Buffy, talking to a guy that looked vaguely familiar.. Scott something or other, she thought he'd been in one of her classes last year. And wasn't he on the basketball team? He was saying something, and Buffy was doing that smiley glance away, glance back thing. Buffy was flirting with him.

Maybe Buffy wasn't taking things quite as hard as she'd made it sound?

Slowly, Willow slipped out, heading the other way. Let Buffy and Scott have their chance to talk, she was certain that Buffy would tell her all about it later. Wasn't it a bit soon to be moving on though? She'd only broken up with Angel last week... No, she chided herself, Buffy was just talking to him. It wasn't as if she was just hopping into bed with the first cute guy who talked to her.

"You can't possibly think that's a good defense!" That sounded like Xander's voice.

"Right. Because you're such a fashion expert?" Female, annoyed, and definitely familiar. Willow just couldn't quite place the name to the voice at first.

Things sounded too quiet after that.

Nervous, remembering the praying mantis-woman and Ampata, Willow edged closer, peeking around the corner. What horrible nasty had her hooks and sights set on Xander this time? She tried to prepare herself for anything.

Xander was kissing Cordelia.

Oh.

Xander and Cordelia were still kissing.

She pinched her arm, hard, convinced that this was just a nightmare. No, they were still kissing. Xander, who she'd had a horrible crush on forever, and Cordelia, who they'd hated for years. Kissing.

Buffy and Scott. Xander and Cordelia. Willow shuddered, suddenly not wanting to loiter in the halls any longer.

Unfortunately, the full moon brought her back that night, wolf-sitting Oz. Since they hadn't been able to find a cure, Giles had proposed some means of temporary confinement. After a lot of debate, they'd ended up settling on the book cage in the school library.

Time with her new boyfriend didn't hold quite as much appeal when he was locked in a cage, twice as large, furry, and snapping long sharp teeth at anything that got too close.

"Someone might get the idea that you aren't having a good day." Angel's voice slid through the air. "Do I smell tears, Willow?"

"Maybe." Willow glanced up, and dredged up a shaky smile for the vampire. "It's been a long day."

"Do you want to talk about it? I'm probably a better listener than he is right now." Angel gestured towards Oz, a hint of a smirk playing over his face.

"I guess so." She sighed, and wrapped her arms around one knee. "Buffy... I think she's moving on. I saw her talking to a guy earlier, flirting. Just last night she was going on about how miserable she is because the two of you...the two of you aren't together, if that makes sense. Can you really get over it that fast, or was she exaggerating for the sympathy, or trying to make herself move on by flirting with what's his name?"

"Ouch." Angel shook his head, looking almost like he was hiding a smile. "That was pretty fast. Although... if she's just talking... I wasn't wanting her hung up on me forever. How's Xander taking her moving on?"

"I don't know. He was too busy kissing Cordelia earlier to talk to." The words hurt, and she could feel the tears threatening again.

"Cordelia?" Angel blinked. "The cheerleader? I know that she's been helping, but..."

"Yeah. Cordelia. We never got along with her, we even had a club about it. Except, now... He was kissing her." Willow closed her eyes, not wanting more tears. "And I had to find out by walking in on them in the hallway. He couldn't even tell me."

In the cage, the werewolf growled, ears flattening as he glared at the vampire.

"Maybe someone's jealous." Angel pointed towards the snarling werewolf. "I never could figure out how much they retain of their mind when they go furry, or what they remember the next day."

"Maybe I can ask him tomorrow." Willow sighed, and let her head fall forward. "So many changes and questions..."

"You look tired. Maybe you should rest for a while?" Oz and I will keep watch over you." Angel offered, his dark eyes looking sympathetic.

"I really shouldn't..." Willow's words cut off with a yawn. His eyes seemed so dark.

"I'll watch over you." He reached out, tilting her chin to look right into her eyes. "I won't let anything eat you tonight, Willow."

Her last thought as she slipped into sleep was that maybe there was some truth to those stories of vampire mind-tricks after all...

Looking at her slumbering form, Angelus smiled. "No, I won't let anything else get you, my friend. You have my word on that."

Carefully, he tried to make her more comfortable, wondering when he'd gone soft. Him, Angelus the Scourge of Europe, protecting a human girl; calling her his friend. But it was true. Willow had become his - or at least, Angel's friend. And he wanted her to be safe.

He was turning into such a sap in his old age.

end Dark Coffee 2: A Bitter Taste.


	3. Spilt Coffee

author: Lucinda

rating: pg13 for violence.

third in the Dark Coffee series, a sequel to 'Coffee and Thoughts' series.

disclaimer: all characters you recognize were created by Joss Whedon for the series BtVS, and do not belong to me.

distribution: if you have permission for the first series or either of the previous Dark Coffee's, then yes. Otherwise please ask first.

notes: AU season 2. Soul is gone, the scoobies don't know this.

thank you to Gabrielle for the once-over and the title.

Angelus sipped at his coffee, smiling at something Willow had said. It was Wednesday, time for their weekly coffee and chatting. Or at least, the time that she had been meeting Angel for coffee and chatting. She still didn't know that he wasn't the same Angel that he'd been when she'd first met him. That omission nagged at him far more than he'd thought it would, and he wasn't quite certain why.

"So, have you... have you tried to talk to them?" She sounded as if she wasn't quite certain that she should be asking. Willow glanced away as she asked, her eyes staring at the ripples on her coffee.

The question startled him, and for a moment, he couldn't quite figure out who she could mean by 'them'. But then her half guilty expression caught up, and it clicked - Spike and Dru. With a small smile, he nodded, and told her just a bit. "A little. Things.... A lot of things have changed, for me and them. You were definitely right about that."

"Does that mean that you.... umm, that you aren't being all angry and fighting with each other anymore, like you were when they first got here?" Willow sipped at her coffee, one hand toying with the pile of sugar wrappers. Willow didn't want to mention certain things in the middle of the Espresso Pump, and it made perfect sense why she wouldn't. "You... things were... not good between all of you then."

"No, no they weren't good at all." He considered that, thinking of how much better everything was with his children now that he wasn't delusionally in love with Buffy, or watching as people tried very unsuccessfully to kill them. "Spike's changed a lot over the years. Dru... really hasn't. But it's better now."

"I'm glad things are a bit better there." She offered a little smile, trying to cheer him up. Her hand tucked her hair back, and she blushed a bit as the next words slipped out. "You've just seemed... a bit unsettled, I guess, since you and Buffy... well, since you aren't together anymore."

Angelus winced, not happy that she'd noticed. At least she was blaming it on the end of things between... ugggh. That had to be one of the definite improvements of things now - no more dating the Slayer. He'd been noticing a few other differences as well. "Things... have been different since that night."

For several long moments, there was quiet at their table, broken only by the sipping of coffee and the gentle beating of Willow's heart. It was an oddly peaceful moment, the sort that he might have expected with his family, years ago, before the whole soul mess. But Willow wasn't family... right?

Willow glanced at her watch and sighed. "I suppose I'm going to have to go soon."

One eyebrow raised as he realized that, despite her words, she had made no move to get up from her seat. Raising his cup, he asked, "You have plans? Maybe something with that guitarist? Or have I lured you away from your homework?"

Willow blushed again, and glanced at her fingers. "Nothing so nice. Buffy asked me and Xander to join her on her umm, walk tonight."

"Willow?" He caught her attention, but then he wasn't quite certain what to say. Let Buffy die? Tempting, but it would definitely not sound like Angel. After sorting through a few options, he settled for a weak sounding "Be careful out there."

Willow moved, and gave him a quick hug as she whispered, "I'll try, thanks."

Angelus sat there for a while after that, feeling oddly warm and baffled. She'd hugged him. It was... weird, and he sort of liked it. Was this what it meant to have a friend?

As he slowly finished the coffee, not enjoying it nearly as much with Willow gone, he realized that he didn't want her patrolling out there with just Buffy and Xander to watch out for her. Willow was smart, and brave, but not really a good fighter. And Xander was too fixated on Buffy to watch out for Willow properly. He'd just have to follow and make certain that she was safe. He could be stealthy, and Buffy had always been terrible at sensing him, what could go wrong?

As he followed Willow to the cemetery, he absently wondered if Buffy ever changed her patrol patterns. It was a bit predictable, and made it very easy to find them. If he'd wanted to, he could have jumped out, snapped Xander's neck, grabbed Willow, and be departing before Buffy could notice that he was following them... But somehow, he didn't think Willow would be amused. There they were, and he really wasn't surprised. Willow was trailing in the rear, glancing from side to side. Buffy was talking, something about a guy in math class, with Xander hanging attentively on her every word.

Was the Slayer even paying attention for vampires or demons? She looked like she was just some teenage girl out for an evening stroll, having stupidly chosen a shortcut through a cemetery. He shook his head, and then caught sight of a pair of vampires trying to sneak up on Willow, the straggler of the group.

That wouldn't do at all. Carefully, he crept up behind them. Angelus shook his head as one minion stepped on a dried bunch of flowers, the stems crackling a little. The noise was enough to make Willow speed up, moving a bit closer to Buffy and Xander, and offer a nervous sounding, "Guys? Are you sure that there's no, you know, nothing out there following us?"

"Relax, Buffy's here, nothing's going to eat us." Xander shrugged, smiling at the Slayer.

Angelus gritted his teeth, and refrained from saying anything as he grabbed one minion, his hand over the idiot's mouth so that he couldn't yell. The stake pierced his heart with a soft popping, and the ashes fell almost silently to the ground, dusting over his shoes. With a small shake of one foot and a frown, he grabbed for the second minion. There was no way that he intended to stand by and watch some minion eat Willow. The second one might have been a bit smarter, or more cautious, because he tried to struggle as he was dragged back, and managed to kick over a dry floral wreath, which rattled against an urn of silk flowers.

"Did you hear that?" Xander jumped closer to Buffy.

"Yeah." Buffy had produced a stake from her jacket, and was looking around the cemetery.

Crouching on the ground, Angelus staked the minion, smirking at the way his eyes bulged in fear at the sight of the stake. No ashes got on his shoes this time. He could see the three between the tombstones, and he watched as Buffy scanned the area, visibly relaxing within seconds.

"It was probably just a raccoon or something. I'm not getting any vibes." The stake returned to her jacket, and she looped an arm through Xander and Willow's, towing them off with her. "So, there's supposed to be a new band at the Bronze on Friday..."

That was the Slayer. Damn if he'd trust her to watch out for Willow.

Angelus had no idea how Willow managed to keep smiling as Buffy chatted on about classes, and having heard that there would be a discount on the drinks on Friday in honor of the band, and listening to Buffy ramble on about Scott Hope, the guy from math class. It was obvious that Xander was trying to make Buffy notice him, and just as obvious that Willow didn't like watching Xander's efforts fail. It wasn't even as if Buffy was shooting Xander's attempted flirtations down, more as if she didn't even notice them. It was almost funny, actually.

He felt very relieved when Willow stopped outside the fifth cemetery, calling out a soft "I'm going to head home - there's that history paper for Friday..."

Buffy just gave a small wave at Willow's excuse, barely looking as if it mattered. "Right, I'll see you tomorrow at the library."

He was feeling much better as she made her way back towards her house. Away from Buffy, who he had no trouble sensing even if she apparently couldn't find him unless she was staring at his face. Willow pulled her jacket a bit closer around her body, and started to walk, her steps quick and light, as if she was afraid that she was being followed.

It turned out that she was closer than she knew. Not just because he was following her, which Angelus wasn't considering as a threat, but because about three blocks from the cemetery, someone else started to follow her. He looked like he should be close to her age, and had a heartbeat, as well as smelling like beer had been spilled over him. Angelus didn't like this - he couldn't see how this boy could have any sort of good intentions. Scowling, he moved closer.

"Stuck up little bitch... she just needs a real man to show her how to relax and have a little fun. Too much books in her life..." The mutters were full of anger and anticipation.

This wouldn't do at all. He could connect the dots and figure out the boy's plan, and it made him furious. This bratling child would not be touching and hurting Willow. With a low growl, Angelus grabbed the boy, one hand over his mouth as he pulled him back. No screams to bring unwanted attention – he couldn't afford that to happen here. His teeth ripped into the boy's throat, drinking deeply. Listening to Buffy and Xander had left him feeling hungry and annoyed anyhow, and blood was always good for soothing that.

He felt much better as the blood flowed, the flavor spiced with pain, fear, and alcohol. A tiny part of him noticed something - a small noise, like a squeak. As he let the body fall, he looked up, and his eyes met Willow's.

Her jaw had dropped, and her wide eyes made it clear that while it was dark, she could see enough to know what had happened. To know that he'd been feeding on the boy, maybe enough to know that the boy was dead.

He felt a cold tension forming in the pit of his stomach. He felt nervous, worried. And it all came down to how would this change things with Willow? It was an unwelcome feeling and an awkward question.

"Angel?" Her voice was high and nervous, and she swayed a bit before collapsing in a cold faint.

This was an unexpected complication.

end Spilt Coffee.


	4. Tea and Sympathy

author: Lucinda

content will be of similar nature to season 2/3 BtVS.

fourth in the Dark Coffee series, a sequel to 'Coffee and Thoughts' series.

disclaimer: all characters you recognize were created by Joss Whedon for the series BtVS, and do not belong to me.

distribution: if you have permission for the first series or either of the previous Dark Coffee's, then yes. Otherwise please ask first.

notes: AU season 2. Soul is gone, the scoobies don't know this.

thank you to Gabrielle for the once-over.

The first thing that Willow noticed was the smell. She could smell a combination of dust, cigarette smoke, a perfume that reminded her of her grandmother, and a hint of blood. As she tried to figure out what had happened that would lead to her being somewhere that would smell like that, she realized that she was resting on a soft bed with a lacy, scratchy comforter. She was still dressed, though she wasn't wearing her shoes.. and when had her shoes come off her feet anyhow? Frowning, it slowly occurred to Willow that her comforter wasn't lacy or scratchy, therefore, this wasn't her bed at all.

She opened her eyes. The room was dark and quiet, and the ceiling looked higher than her own. Reassuringly, she wasn't tied up, or chained, or anything like that, and she didn't feel like she was injured. She'd been on her way home after a patrol with Buffy, she'd felt like she was being followed... and then what? There had been a noise, or something, from an alley, and she'd foolishly decided to look.

Memory returned. She'd seen a dark-haired guy with his face buried in the neck of a vaguely familiar jock that she'd seen around the school. It had been obvious - vampire feeding. She didn't know why the vampire had looked up, but when those yellow eyes had met hers, he'd been more surprised than she was, and his features had changed. The vampire had been Angel. Angel had... he'd bitten that guy and just let him fall in the alley when she'd caught him.

Of course, this wasn't the alley, and she had no idea how she'd ended up here instead of there, not that she really wanted to be waking up in one of Sunnydale's alleys at night anyhow. Had Angel brought her here? Where was here anyway?

Looking around the room, she saw one of those old-fashioned standing wardrobes, a door open just far enough to show the edges of several long gowns. A pair of shoes had gotten caught, preventing the door from closing properly. There was a low dresser with a mirror on the top, though it was half hidden by the rows of porcelain dolls strewn across the dresser. Some of them had been bound, their arms tied to their bodies. Others had been blindfolded or gagged, both in some cases, and she could see that a few of them had no eyes at all. There was a hairbrush resting in front of the dolls, and a tea set painted with some sort of twisting shapes.

"Oh, you're awake!" An unfamiliar woman's voice giggled from the doorway. "Daddy said that you were only resting, and that you'd had a terrible shock."

Looking at the doorway, Willow tensed as she realized the woman was Drusilla. Drusilla, the crazy, psychic lover of William the Bloody, one of the vampires turned by Angelus, part of the Scourge of Europe... It was one thing to ask Angel if he was getting along better with his children, that was... well, more because it had made him upset that they were fighting than any great care for Spike and Drusilla on her part. But this was not a situation that she'd ever wanted to find herself in. "Ummm... hello, Drusilla. Did Angel put me here? In your room... I mean, this is your room, right? Because I can't really picture Spike or Angel in long dresses, and there's the dolls, and the pretty tea set, and..."

Drusilla moved closer, laughing, "Oh, your words do spill out like a waterfall! Yes, it is my room, and I was hoping that we could have tea when you woke up. Daddy said that we were to be nice and gentle with you. No biting, no hitting, and no nasty spells."

Willow tried to smile, feeling slightly better about the situation now. "No nasty spells... does that mean that you can do spells? One of my teachers is a techno-pagan, which is sort of witchy, but I don't think you're a techno-pagan like she is, and there's a girl I know whose mom was a witch... umm, you mentioned tea?"

Drusilla just giggled and moved to the dresser, pouring something from the teapot into the cups before turning to hand Willow one of them. On closer inspection, the twisting shapes turned out to be elaborate flowers, their stems entangled with elegant swoops. The cup was warm, and the liquid inside was paler than the teas that Willow was used to seeing Giles drink, but it smelled sort of tea-like.

"Is something wrong with your tea?" Drusilla asked, and then frowned, "Oh, I forgot the cream and sugar!"

"I'm not worried about the cream or sugar, tea's okay without those," Willow offered, trying to reassure Drusilla even as she wondered why she was worried about the vampire getting upset. Maybe she just didn't want the vampire getting upset and taking it out on her... "This is just different from the tea that Giles normally drinks, that's all. I was wondering what sort it is."

"It's Green Tea, like they drink in the Far East," Drusilla informed her, and then took a delicate sip from her cup. "I first tasted it in China, when Grandmummy took us there. My Spike killed his first Slayer there, you know," Drusilla added with pride.

Willow nodded, remembering that Giles had said something about a Slayer during the Boxer rebellion, though he'd sounded much more afraid than proud. Carefully, she took a sip. While the flavor was definitely different than the tea Giles drank, it wasn't bad. "Slayers are hard to kill. The fact that Spike has killed two is part of the reason why the Watchers are afraid of him."

"My Spike is a ferocious beast and he will eat them all up," Drusilla declared, then frowned, "He could use a good meal, he's not been well since he fought those nasty Slayers."

Having no idea what to say in response to that, Willow just sipped the tea again. She really wished that Angel was here, and while she was thinking about it, what had Angel been doing biting that guy? Something seemed off about that whole thing...

"When you finish the cup, I can look at your future in the leaves," Drusilla offered. "My other daddy said that was a wicked thing, but my Angel-daddy only said no biting, no hitting, and no nasty spells, he didn't say anything about reading the leaves."

Willow blinked, part of her wondering if that would really work, and another part wondering what sort of future she had, living on the Hellmouth. "Reading doesn't sound that bad to me. Especially not reading books or leaves or stuff like that."

As they sipped at the tea, Willow felt slightly calmer. She still wanted Angel to be there, but she was no longer expecting Drusilla to suddenly rip her throat out. Glancing back at her cup, she was faintly surprised to notice that there was no more tea, only a scattering of tea leaves and what looked remarkably like dust. "I guess I drank it all."

"Oh, let me see!" Drusilla reached over, looking at the cup. Sounding disappointed, she murmured, "Oh, no travel, no sweet romance in the near future... lots of danger, something lurking..."

"Are you sure that's not me waiting to talk to her?" Angel's voice carried a bit more of his accent than normal, and it also held traces of amusement.

"My Angel..." Drusilla smiled. "See, I've been a good girl; we talked and had tea together. I didn't hurt your little wisp at all."

Willow managed a smile as Drusilla let go of her hand and skipped over to Angel, giving him a kiss on the cheek. "I'll just go keep my Spike company while you talk with her."

Drusilla left the room, and Angel shut the door and walked over, sitting on the bed. "I hope she didn't frighten you. I wasn't certain how long you'd be asleep."

Willow shook her head, offering softly, "She didn't do anything. It's just... I woke up in a strange room, and then Drusilla was there, and we had a talk about tea and Spike. I'm glad that you told her to be good though."

"You're my friend, Willow. I wouldn't want her to hurt you after I brought you here," Angel's hands were twitching, fingers lacing together and moving apart.

"Umm... why am I here, anyhow?" Willow asked, still wanting the pieces to make sense in her mind. Angel had been biting that guy, and why had he taken her to the place where his evil kids lived anyhow? "It's been a kind of long day."

Angel fidgeted a little, glancing anywhere but at Willow. Twice, his mouth opened, but closed before he said anything. Finally, a soft, almost embarrassed whisper emerged, "I got worried and decided to follow you. When you were on your way home, someone else was following you."

"The guy in the alley?" Willow's voice was barely louder than Angel's. He'd been following her? He'd been worried? "What happened?"

"He was muttering to himself, and the things that he was saying..." Angel shook his head, eyes flickering from brown to gold. "Cruel, violent things. He wanted to hurt you, and then... I just lost it. I'm sorry, Willow."

Willow shivered as her mind whispered all the horrible things that the guy could have been intending. "He... I'm not good with pain, it's not my friend."

"He wanted to break you, destroy your innocence, your sense of self." Angel's words were low, with a hint of growl. "Just because he thought that he could, because he'd no other plans for the night."

Willow gasped as horrible images filled her mind. Bruises, broken bones, rape. Her mom had written some papers about that once, and Willow had accidentally found her folder of reference articles and pictures. She'd had nightmares for weeks after seeing the things in there. She could feel herself start to shiver, and a whimper escaped.

Angel was there, pulling her close to him, wrapping strong arms around her. Soft words were repeated, barely catching her attention at all. "I've got you, I've got you. I'm not about to let some drunken boy hurt what's mine..."

Clinging to him, she shook, feeling terrified at all the things that could have happened. She didn't even bother asking him why he hadn't left the boy for the police, or tried to change his mind, she just trembled at her narrow escape and savored the fact that someone had saved her from a horrible fate.

After all, Angel was her friend; he wouldn't lie to her. His eyes were so troubled, so conflicted - nobody could fake that, even if they wanted to.

"I'm glad you were there for me," she whispered.

"I'm not going away, Willow. I'll always be there, near you, watching over you," Angel's words were soft, and the low growl in his voice gave them a subtly menacing tone. "You're... mine, and I'm not about to let anyone hurt what's mine."

"Does that mean I don't have to worry so much about Spike and Drusilla?" Willow asked, glancing at the bound and blinded dolls.

"Spike will leave you alone," Angel assured her. "Dru... She'll probably want you to come over for tea, and to talk about her dolls with you."

"Can she... can she really do spells, or was that just... sort of a precaution?" Willow asked, thinking back to that list of things Drusilla had said she wasn't supposed to do.

Angel chuckled, "She can do some. Who knows, she might decide to try teaching you."

"Ummm." Willow couldn't quite decide if that would be a fascinating chance to learn about magic or a terrifying effort to please an unpredictable teacher. Maybe both.

"I'll make certain she knows to be gentle with you," Angel chuckled again. "I told you, I'll take care of you."

Willow was so relieved by this that it didn't even occur to her to wonder why Angel had brought her here, wherever 'here' was, instead of her house. Nor did she think too much on his statement that she was his, assuming that he simply meant that she was his friend.

end DC4: Tea and Sympathy


	5. Dark Moments

author: Lucinda

content will be of similar nature to season 2/3 BtVS.

fifth in the Dark Coffee series, a sequel to 'Coffee and Thoughts' series.

disclaimer: all characters you recognize were created by Joss Whedon for the

series BtVS, and do not belong to me.

distribution: if you have permission for the first series or either of the

previous Dark Coffee's, then yes. Otherwise please ask first.

notes: AU season 2. Soul is gone, the Scoobies don't know this. Once again, thanks to Gabrielle for beta-reading this for me.

Willow closed the door to her room, sighing at the soft click. Things had seemed slightly off ever since the night that she'd gone patrolling with Buffy and Angel had ended up saving her from a drunken jock. He'd taken her home with him, and she'd ended up meeting Drusilla and having tea with her before Angel had walked her home. Things had been strange. Except for school. That had been, well, pretty much the same as always, except that they'd started reading Wuthering Heights for English class.

Leaning against the door, Willow focused on the one thing that had been nagging at her all day. Why had Angel taken her to his place instead of here, to her parent's house? When had Angel's place become the same place that Spike and Dru were staying? And if that had been their place instead of Angel's place, when had he gotten on good enough terms with them to just drop in on them with an unconscious guest?

She didn't have answers to those questions.

Maybe their place was just closer than wherever it was that Angel had been staying? It had certainly been close to the alley where she'd fainted. Maybe it was just that Dru seemed to think her 'Angel-daddy' was wonderful. But still, why not just bring her home? There was something there…

She wondered what had happened to the jock. The guy who had been intending to… Shivering, Willow pushed the thought away, deciding that she really didn't want to think about it. Not about what he'd been intending to do. Thank God that Angel had stopped him. Angel had…

Willow froze as she realized just how Angel had stopped him. He'd bitten the jock. Bitten him and just let him fall to the ground in a limp heap. Angel had bitten someone, maybe killed him, and all to save her.

"Something is seriously wrong with that. I was saved from the human when the vampire… He didn't mean to, he told me that he just lost his temper. It was an accident," Willow whispered out loud, her voice wavering on the last word. Accident.

"He must feel terrible, all broody and upset. That's too much like the sort of thing evil vampires do for him to be comfortable," Willow murmured. A part of her wondered if it made her a bad person that she didn't feel bad for the guy who was probably dead from being dropped in a Sunnydale alley at night. Pushing that thought away, she sighed, "Angel must feel so guilty."

Buffy and Xander hadn't even noticed that she was distracted and quiet today. Oz might have, except that he'd been so busy with band-practice. Giles hadn't noticed either. Maybe she was just easily overlooked.

Walking over to her desk, she gave her fish some food and pulled out one of her old jewelry boxes. Drusilla had talked about 'nasty spells', and while she was very glad that it had been in the context of 'Angel-daddy said not to use them', she wondered just who that had been directed at. Not that she'd done anything difficult. A little help with a few charms, that witch-finding potion, and she'd managed to float a few pencils. She was going to try floating a ring, something that she wouldn't miss horribly if things went wonky.

Slowly, the first ring lifted into the air. A second floated up. The third was almost level with them when a tap at the outside door made Willow squeak and all three rings fell to the desktop.

"Willow?" Angel's voice sounded guilty, even through the door.

"Angel," Willow looked at the door, ignoring the tiny pings as the rings fell back to the desk. She walked over, opening the door to reveal Angel. "Hey. Umm, is there some sort of strange thing you need me to look up on the computer again?"

Angel was smiling. Maybe more of a smirk, but the corners of his lips were definitely higher than the middle. "Am I interrupting?"

"Not really, I was only trying..." Willow faltered, her cheeks growing hot as Angel looked at her with that smirky grin. "Nothing that can't wait until later. How are you? I mean, after what happened with that guy."

Angel stood there, not really looking at her fish tank, and sighed, "I think I'll manage to live with myself. I don't know if I could say the same if I hadn't stopped him."

Willow told herself that Angel's eyes hadn't just flickered to gold when she'd asked about the guy. "That's good to hear. I mean, I wouldn't want you to feel bad for trying to protect me… or someone. I'd been worrying about that, not that you need someone to worry about you, but I was worried. That's what friends do, they worry about each other."

"I know. Thanks," Angel leaned against the wall, and pulled a small book out of his jacket. "I brought this over for you."

Willow took the book, her hand shaking as she felt the dark leather. Her mind turned to the memory of Buffy talking about how Angel had given her a volume of poetry once. She wasn't sure how she'd react to something like that. "You brought me a book?"

"Dru wanted you to have it."

Willow swallowed, pulling the book closer and feeling much more nervous. A book of poetry would have been easier to deal with. "She did? Why? Um, I mean…"

Something about Angel's smile seemed indescribably wrong as he replied, "She likes you. She always wanted a younger sister, and she's decided that now she has one. You."

Willow found herself sitting on the bed, staring at the book as if it might sprout fangs and bite her. Over the years, she'd wondered about having a family, a brother or sister to talk to, share secrets with, even argue and fight with. Not once, however, had she imagined a sister like Drusilla. An image formed of herself and Dru, sprawled on a large bed with a ruffled comforter, dressed in fuzzy flannel pajamas, painting each other's fingernails as her blinded and bound dolls watched from the dresser. "Oh. Oh boy…"

Angel's hand settled on her shoulder, "Don't worry so much, Willow. I'll take care of you."

Willow nodded, fingers sliding over the book. She believed that Angel would keep being there for her. Just like he had been last night. "I know you will."

End DC5: Dark Moments


	6. Coffee Heights

author: Lucinda

content will be of similar nature to season 2/3 BtVS.

sixth in the Dark Coffee series, a sequel to 'Coffee and Thoughts' series.

disclaimer: all characters you recognize were created by Joss Whedon for the series BtVS, and do not belong to me.

distribution: if you have permission for the first series or either of the previous Dark Coffee's, then yes. Otherwise please ask first.

notes: AU season 2. Soul is gone, the scoobies don't know this.

dc6..dc6..dc6..dc6..

Willow sighed as she turned the page of the big book, one of the many compendiums of demons that Giles kept in the library. Buffy had run into something on patrol, and hadn't recognized it beyond 'big scary demon', and when it had proven resistant to wooden stakes, the Slayer had retreated.

Thus the research. She had a stack of books, Giles and Miss Calendar each had a stack of books, and Buffy had gone back out to patrol. They'd been left with Buffy's description, 'about eight feet tall, dark scales, a snout with lots of yellow fangs and drool, and these long arms with talons... like gorilla long, but with only two fingers. And it had this funny smell, like old bananas.'

"Giant scaly, but too many fingers. Two fingers and long arms, but only four feet tall. Big and scaly, yellow teeth, eeew... those aren't arms." Willow shuddered in revulsion.

"Willow should probably head home, she does have school tomorrow," Miss Calendar spoke.

"I'm not that tired," Willow protested.

"Actually," she pulled out a half sheet of paper and wrote out a few lines. "Here's a couple decent websites for types of demons. I've been making a few inquiries among my contacts. Not everyone's as computer shy as Rupert here."

"Jenny... Miss Calendar is right, you do have school tomorrow," Giles murmured. "Do you need a lift home?"

"It isn't that far, and things are pretty quiet around the school. I'll be fine," Willow shook her head, "Though I appreciate the offer."

Willow hadn't even left the school grounds before she was telling herself that she'd just done something stupid. Her confidence in the boring safety of the area between the school and her house that had seemed so solid in the well lit library that smelled of books and furniture polish had evaporated outside in the dark, with the sounds of crickets and the rustle of the wind in the leaves. There didn't have to be a lot of demons or vampires between the school and her house. There only had to be one.

Unfortunately, after about six o'clock when the sports teams finished their practice, the doors were locked. Oh, you could still get out easily enough, but you couldn't go back in the building. She couldn't go back in the building.

"For someone so smart, once in a while I can do something that's really dumb," Willow muttered. Dumb or not, she wasn't going to just stand here and feel nervous. She might as well be a moving target instead of a stationary one.

By the time she reached Verde Street, Willow was certain that she was being followed. She didn't know who, or perhaps what, but she would bet that there was someone else on the street. It made her wonder if she'd make it the three blocks left to her house, and she started to walk faster.

Willow was certain that she'd heard a footstep that wasn't hers.

Her heart was racing by the time she reached her door, and her hand shook as she pulled her keys from her purse. She stepped inside and pulled the door shut behind her before she even considered reaching for the light switch. Instead, she turned and looked out the window, uncertain if she wanted to see someone that had been following or if she would rather see an empty street.

There was someone standing down the street, at the edge of light from one of the street lamps. She couldn't make out who it was, but… definitely someone. Someone that had been following her. Though the fact that she had been followed didn't tell her who, or why. Maybe there as someone else out there hunting vampires and demons – Buffy couldn't be the only one. Maybe it was just someone out for a walk now thinking that she was easily frightened. Maybe it was a vampire looking for dinner.

She didn't sleep well that night. School the next day was rather a blur as well. There had been a quiz in History, and a big test in math, but she didn't remember much about them. Lunch was bland, with rumors about Harmony and Devon getting caught by a lifeguard on the beach, and that Devon's excuse of 'looking for her bikini top' hadn't flown. She did remember that Xander and Cordelia had been sneaking off together.

Before she realized it, school was out and she was sitting in the Espresso Pump. She had taken over a small table in the corner, with papers spread before her and the start of an outline for an essay on the relationship dynamics of Wuthering Heights.

"I can't keep zoning out, that sort of thing will get me killed in Sunnydale," Willow muttered.

"There are so many people in here. Why do they all gather together?" The lilting tones could only belong to Drusilla.

Willow glanced up, half convinced that she was imagining things. Drusilla couldn't be here in the coffee shop, could she? What possible reason would there be for her to be here? Drusilla was there, in a flowing gown that looked like red lace over satin, her hair pulled back with a matching ribbon. One pale hand rested on Angel's arm, and he was giving her an indulgent smile.

Angel's voice still carried a bit more of his accent when he spoke, "They come here for the coffee, Princess. Why don't you sit here with Willow and I'll get some coffee for all of us. And remember, behave."

Drusilla smiled and moved to sit across from Willow, peering at her papers and the larger size paperback Wuthering Heights. "What do you have here?"

"I'm supposed to do an essay on the characters in this book, Wuthering Heights," Willow explained, pointing to the book as she spoke. Part of her was wondering if the book was old enough for Drusilla to have read it back when she was human, or if she'd have even been interested in it if it had been printed yet. Then again, back in the old days, it was so much harder for books to be spread about… "Our teacher wants us to discuss how the main guy, Heathcliffe, interacts with one of the other characters. Any of the other characters. I'm trying to figure out which one I should use."

"Ahhh. I read that book, many years ago," Drusilla smiled, her fingers reaching out to brush the cover. "But my copy had a hard cover, and had been wrapped in green cloth. I liked the first Catherine."

"Really?" Willow asked. She'd thought that Catherine the elder reminded her an awful lot of Cordelia, and had figured that if she'd lived in that setting, Catherine would have disliked her every bit as much as Cordelia did now. "What did you like about her? She isn't much like the people I talk to very often."

"She was bold and confident, and moved to take what she wanted. I'd always been told that proper young ladies weren't supposed to do such things," Drusilla whispered. "Not human ladies."

"Well… the proper ones didn't act like the first Catherine. She was bold, and confident, and acted to get what she wanted. She didn't let the people around her tell her too much about things in some ways… and she did in others. She didn't let them keep her from running about the moors, but when she married, it was to someone that society deemed acceptable. I can't help but wonder if she'd have been happier if she'd just told them to go away and married Heathcliffe," Willow mused. "It's obvious that he's the one she really wanted, and she just figured that she could boss Linden around and make him do whatever she wanted."

"No arguments… where's the fun in that?" Drusilla asked.

"Coffee all around," Angel spoke, placing the coffees on the table between Willow's papers. "Raspberry for you, Willow, since you enjoyed it so much the other day. Hazelnut for you, Princess."

"Thanks Angel," Willow smiled at him. Glancing at the table, she shook her head and put most of the papers away. "I was just explaining to Drusilla that I'm supposed to write a paper about Heathcliffe from Wuthering Heights. Well, Heathcliffe and how he interacts with someone else."

"He was quite the bastard, as I recall," Angel mused.

Willow tried to convince herself that Angel didn't look like he was thinking fond thoughts about Heathcliffe the bastard. Any fondness had to be for Drusilla, or for herself. Not an awful figure from literature.

They ended up sitting there discussing Wuthering Heights over multiple cups of coffee. The whole experience was a bit surreal, especially when Drusilla insisted that they had to walk her little red sister home safe.

Her pages of notes from their discussion wouldn't let her convince herself that the night had been part of a long, strange dream. Willow didn't let herself think about what it meant that Drusilla had called her a little sister. Or that Drusilla was taking just as much an interest in her as her own parents… which wasn't very flattering to her parents, come to think of it. An insane vampire and a brooding vampire couldn't be a better family than the Rosenbergs… The implications would be too disturbing.

End Dark Coffee 6: Coffee Heights.


	7. Harsh Words

Author: Lucinda

Rated t for teen - content similar to seasons 2/3 BtVS

seventh in the Dark Coffee series

Disclaimer: all characters that you recognize from BtVS belong to Joss Whendon & his writers.

Distribution: by permission, and with the previous coffee stories.

Notes: diverges in s2 BtVS - only Spike & Dru are aware that Angel has lost his soul.

dc7..dc7..dc7..dc7..

Angelus sat by the fireplace, a mug of coffee beside him as he thought about Willow. A century ago, he would have already slaughtered her parents, assuming he could catch them in town, and either killed or turned Willow. A century ago, he wouldn't be bothering with meeting over coffee and talking about anything and nothing. A century ago, he would never have considered her as... a friend. Attractive, yes. A possible meal - easily. A night of entertainment, blood, sex and death? With delight. A possible child? If he had noticed the devious and quick mind that she had before he'd killed her. But he wouldn't have been making and keeping weekly appointments for coffee and conversations.

He wouldn't have been telling Drusilla not to hurt her. Hell, a century ago, he'd have probably been standing beside Drusilla, nibbling at her neck and shoulder while they talked about the best ways to hurt Willow, knowing that hearing the plans made would heighten her fear and make the eventual pain and blood even sweeter.

He didn't want to kill her. He didn't even want to break her mind, ravage her body, and then kill her. He... he liked her. Damn.

Drusilla was sitting near the doorway, humming to herself as she played with her tarot cards. He wasn't certain quite where she'd found them, but a few of the cards in the deck had old bloodstains near one corner, suggesting that it hadn't been a simple purchase.

Glancing at Drusilla, he asked, "What do you think of Willow, my pretty lass?"

"Her mind thinks quickly, she has so many questions... we need to convince her to ask them all, instead of keeping some hidden behind her pink cheeks," Drusilla smiled at him. "She drank tea with me and we had a lovely chat about books."

"Does that mean you want to have another chat with her about books?" He wasn't certain if Drusilla meant anything else by her words. While it had been fun to break her mind, it had left her rather hard to make any sense of at times.

Pale hands clasping together, Drusilla looked at him, "Oh, can I, please? I do so like her, and I haven't had anyone to talk to about stories and dollies since the little numbers fell apart and it rained people from the sky."

"You'll remember not to hurt her? And that as Willow is still human, she's more fragile than you or I?"

"Of course, my Angel-Daddy," Drusilla purred.

Friday rolled around and as soon as the sun set, Angelus, Spike, Drusilla and a few of the minions headed towards the college. Friday meant parties at the fraternities, and drunken frat boys were easy prey. The alcohol in the blood didn't taste bad either. After having two of them for dinner, and watching Dru lure in one to eat, Angelus lost interest in the remaining unfortunates. Looking at Spike and the minions, he gestured towards the still living frat boys, "They're all yours. Have fun, don't stay out too late or you'll catch a sunburn."

As drunk as some of them were, he wondered if it might almost be a mercy to spare them from the hangovers that surviving until morning would have brought them. Knowing Spike, it probably wasn't… Oh well.

"Daddy, can we go visit my little sister?" Drusilla asked, licking the spatters of blood from her hand.

"I don't see why not, Princess. But I don't think she'd find the frat boys quite as amusing as we did, so it might be best not to talk about them," he cautioned.

"No? Not even the way that fingers running over breasts can make them go all silly and dumb?" Drusilla looked at him, her dark eyes open wide.

Angelus shook his head, "Not tonight, Princess. Maybe another time."

He reminded Dru several times on the walk over towards Willow's house that Willow was still human, still fragile. That there were a range of things that it was best not to talk about with her… not yet, at any rate.

They neared the house to hear a woman's voice in a near-yell, directed at Willow. "… disappointed in you, Willow. I expected better from someone of your intelligence than to be taken in by something as absurd, as foolish as this New-Age Wiccan nonsense! If people could really burn herbs, chant a few lines and make things happen, there would be a great many more people suffering and in misery! More people suddenly falling hopelessly in love with others! This is the sort of nonsense that comes from getting involved with musicians and people who call themselves Angel, or Bunny, or Dew-lilly!"

There was a pause in the shouting, and Angelus wondered if maybe Willow was attempting to defend herself.

"The fact that you borrowed this book from a friend does not make it any less a waste of paper! I had hoped that you could avoid becoming yet another wretched teen statistic, that having high grades and avoiding trendy peer groups would keep you separated from this nonsense. Clearly I was mistaken." The harsh words and angry tones belonged to a woman, and Angelus assumed that this must be Willow's mother.

"We have a new plan, Princess. I'll send Willow outside, you take her off for coffee, talk with her, distract her, cheer her up if you can. I'll have a few words with her mother. Be sure to keep Willow away from home for a few hours," Angelus snarled, his fangs just itching for a few moments with Mrs. Rosenberg.

"Daddy?" Drusilla's voice was soft and thoughtful.

"Hmm?"

"Do Willow and her mum know that we're vampires?" She asked.

"Willow does, I doubt that her mother has the first clue about that yet," he growled.

"Then put your teeth away or she'll know too soon," Drusilla insisted.

"Right," Angelus sighed, and took a few moments to regain his calm enough to keep his fangs hidden. Knocking at the door, he wondered how this would play out. He wondered if tonight would shatter Willow's illusions that he was still all… souled.

"Don't you dare open that door, Willow! I'm not done talking to you!"

The door opened, revealing Willow, her eyes shining with tears, and more tears flowing down her cheeks. Some of them flowed over a bright red handprint on her left cheek. "Angel? I'm not sure that now's a very good time…"

He reached forward, one fingertip tracing a tear-track over the handprint. It made him angry, and he could feel the urge to let out his demon and play with Mrs. Rosenberg. "I was wondering if you could spend a bit of time with Dru? She gets lonely sometimes…"

"You tell your absurd friend to go away, young lady!"

He could see the angry woman now, and there was a definite resemblance to Willow in the bones of her face, and the color of her eyes. Oh yes, he would spend some quality time with her…

With a sniffle, Willow slipped past Angelus and darted towards Drusilla. "I can't stay here right now…"

"Dry your eyes, little sister. We shall go drink coffee and talk about pretty flowers, and I shall tell you some of what the stars whispered to Miss Edith," Drusilla's voice was soft, and he suspected that she was trying to soothe Willow.

Delighting in the fact that the invitation to Angel was still valid, Angelus stepped into the house. "Mrs. Rosenberg, I don't think you understand the situation here."

"I understand enough to know that you're one of those bad influences, leading her into misbehavior! Next there will be skipping school, criminal behavior, and teen pregnancy! You stay away from my daughter, and maybe I can get her back to behaving properly," she stalked towards him, her expression fairly menacing… for a human.

"Mrs. Rosenberg, you have no idea just how much of a bad influence I can be," Angelus smiled at her.

She slapped him.

Angelus blinked, not quite believing that this woman, this human woman had slapped him. Was in fact raising her hand to do it again.

He reached out, catching her arm and squeezing until he could feel the bones grating together and tears welled up in her eyes. "You caught me by surprise. I had no idea that you liked to play so rough…"

Then he threw her into the wall. Several pictures fell to the floor, and at least one of them broke. She slid towards the floor, leaving a dent in the wall, though the paper kept the color consistent. He leapt across the room, landing in a crouch beside her, his eyes fading to amber and his fangs dropping, "You're going to come with me, and we'll have a few more words somewhere else. Willow doesn't need to come home and find you like that…"

"Afraid to let her know that you'll hit a woman?" the words shook, more afraid than angry.

Angelus laughed, grabbing her by the throat with one hand, squeezing enough to hurt and prevent screaming but not enough to make her pass out. "Oh, we've only just begun our little talk, Mrs. Rosenberg, and you have no idea just what I'm capable of doing."

Part of Angelus was thinking that this woman explained so much of why Willow was reluctant to take part in the normal teen activities, why she seemed so shy and awkward with her peers. Another part was just furious that she'd struck Willow, that she'd struck someone that was his. Only he had that right…

Willow was part of his family now. He wasn't certain when it had happened, or quite how. But it had.

"She's part of my family now. That means that the old family has to go," he grinned, leaning in close, and licked the side of her cheek. "I wonder how you'll taste…"

She was terrified now, clawing at his hand with her pitiful human strength, her short nails digging at his skin. She made little gasping squeaks, and her eyes were wide and rolling, like a spooked horse. If she could talk, he wondered if she'd be shrieking threats, pleading for her life, or insulting him. Not that it mattered.

"We'll continue this little chat at my place. There's no chance of anyone trying to stop me there."

He spent the time carrying her to the mansion talking out loud, letting his accent thicken as he went into vivid detail about whips and chains, about his boy's fondness for railroad spikes. About how Drusilla liked to tear out eyes, and sometimes forced people to swallow their own eyeballs, though more often than not she managed to pop them in the extraction. He talked about how he had some sturdy manacles in the basement, and how some of the boys had been a while without the company of a healthy woman, and while she might not be too healthy by the time they got back, they might still find her comely enough to have their ways with her.

It could be days, maybe even weeks before Willow's mother was found, tragically killed. He was just trying to sort out the right setting… abandoned in the woods? Tossed into the ocean? Returning her mangled and broken body to the Rosenberg home was right out, he didn't want to subject Willow to that sort of thing just yet. It would be better, more enjoyable to ease her into such things, to the point where she would cheerfully pick up a whip or knife herself without trembling and asking 'why?' and without any of her supposed friends noticing the changes until he and Willow had them chained up on the wall.

"It's so fortunate that Willow has good friends like meself and Drusilla to help her through your disappearance and the eventual finding of your broken body," he told Mrs. Rosenberg. "She's going to need it."

End Dark Coffee 7: Harsh Words.


	8. Images in the Steam

author: Lucinda

content will be of similar nature to season 2/3 BtVS.

eighth in the Dark Coffee series, a sequel to 'Coffee and Thoughts' series.

disclaimer: all characters you recognize were created by Joss Whedon for the series BtVS, and do not belong to me.

distribution: if you have permission for the first series or any of the previous Dark Coffee's, then yes. Otherwise please ask first.

notes: AU season 2. Soul is gone, the scoobies don't know this.

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Drusilla tugged Willow away from her house, down the street to a little green area. It wasn't quite a park, more of an empty lot left to grow grass and wildflowers.

Once there, Drusilla paused, looking at Willow. Her hand lifted, cool fingers and sharp nails drifting over the still-red mark that Willow's mother had left. "She hit you, little sister. Why would your mummy hit you?"

Willow sighed, her mind turning over her memories of earlier this evening. "She found the book you lent me, the one with the stories about faeries and the cantrips and the house spells? She... she doesn't approve of things like that. She thinks faerie tales are a waste of time, and that magic spells is a bunch of superstitious nonsense."

"Spells can be very dangerous, and they are quite real," Drusilla insisted. "Otherwise, how could the nasty gypsies have hurt my Daddy, and why would he tell me not to cast mean spells on you?"

Willow didn't quite manage a smile as she remembered how Angel had given Drusilla a list of things she couldn't do, so that Willow would be safer with the dark haired vampiress. "You know that magic is real, and I know that. My mother doesn't. I guess she's never run into any. Maybe her life's been safer than mine..."

Drusilla snorted and muttered something that Willow couldn't quite hear.

"I knew that she wasn't happy with me. That she didn't approve of some of what I did, of my friends…" Willow sniffled, the mark on her face starting to go from numb to burning. "I just never thought that she'd hit me."

Drusilla wrapped her arm around Willow, cuddling the girl closer. "There, there, luv. I'm sure that she will be very, very sorry."

Willow leaned into Drusilla's embrace, the tears slipping from her eyes. She wasn't used to having someone there to comfort her, and while Angel was always willing to listen, she just didn't feel comfortable crying on his shoulder that the other students at the school were mean to her, or how much it had hurt that only Oz had seen her as desirable, or how it stung that her parents were always going away. Though maybe, if this was what her mother's notice felt like, away was better… The part of her that wanted her parents to be perfect tried to insist that is wasn't always like this, that her mother had only been upset because she thought that Willow was wasting her time on make-believe, that she hadn't meant to hit her daughter. But Sheila Rosenberg was the woman who called differing political and religious views 'valid alternate belief systems' and had written papers about sexual fetishism as 'acceptable alternatives for consenting adults.' How could those things be 'acceptable alternatives' and 'valid alternate belief systems' if her own flesh and blood wasn't even allowed to read about them?

She barely noticed as Drusilla led her away from the green space, further away from her home.

The next thing that Willow noticed was the jumbled scents of flowers, mingled with dry grass, turned earth, and the too sweet wrongness of dying flowers. The moonlight gleamed on pale stone shapes, with long shadows reaching towards her. Blinking, she glanced around and determined that they were walking in the eastern portion of the Our Lady of Hope cemetery. And she'd been dabbing at her eyes with a lace edged handkerchief that smelled of lavender.

"Drusilla? Why are we in a cemetery?" Her voice wavered a little, but she couldn't sort out if it was from the tears or from nerves. After all, she was in a cemetery, at night, alone with a vampire.

"There's a game that I play sometimes. Spike doesn't enjoy it, and Daddy called it silly… will you play it with me?" Drusilla looked at Willow, her eyes pleading and her pale hands folded near her chin. "Please?"

Willow was tempted to tell Drusilla right there that of course she'd play. However, there was a little cautious voice screaming at her, so she compromised by asking, "Maybe you could tell me about this game?"

"How silly of me, of course you can't play when you don't know the rules!" Drusilla walked ahead by about four graves before turning around to walk back to Willow, "But you didn't say that you wouldn't play, you asked me how it was played."

Willow nodded, unsure if there would be a good thing to say just now.

"First you need to go to a cemetery, like this one. Then you find a grave, and it has to be someone that you didn't know, and that you don't think you killed, that's very important," Drusilla waggled one finger at Willow. "Then you make up a story about them. Something that they might have done, what they might have wanted… maybe about how they died. And we tell each other stories about the people who live here now. When it gets too late in the night, we stop telling stories and go somewhere safe for the day."

Willow considered that, and felt herself starting to smile. "I guess we could do that. It could be fun…"

"Oh, splendid!" She clapped her hands. "Here, I'll start. This one says his name was Howard Jason Donnelly, that he was born in 1874 and died in 1945. I wasn't in the area then, so I didn't know him or kill him, so he's fair game. I think… when he was young, he fell in love with a pretty blond girl down the street. But she was being courted by the son of the Mayor, and he wanted to prove his devotion to her, so he sent her flowers. The flowers didn't work, so he sent her pretty birds. Then he slipped out one day to beg her for a chance. But she laughed at him! Broke his heart by telling him that he couldn't give her the pretty baubles that she wanted, or take her to the lovely parties. And then he went away, very, very sad. So then he sent her thorn and weeds. He sent her the wings torn off of pretty birds. But then one day, he found someone in his room, a woman with dark eyes and a sad smile. She told him how she had loved him from afar, and begged him to give her a chance. He kissed her, and they got married, she bore him six children, and they lived happily ever after… until she snapped in a fit of temper and struck him in the head with a frying pan and he died."

"Death by frying pan? Ouch…" Willow murmured. Her eye paused on an elaborate marble stone, carve with roses and the lettering swooping almost like the italic fonts on a computer. "I'm not sure how good I'll be at this game, but here goes. This grave is for Julia Rothchilde, and it says that she was born in 1878 and died in 1894… she was only sixteen. Hmmm… Julia was the youngest child of a wealthy family. Her parents gave her pretty dresses, and some pretty dolls, and lessons in French, and to play the piano, and singing. They wanted her to marry a wealthy man and become a respectable pillar of society. But Julia didn't want that! Because she had fallen in love… in love with a handsome young man who's father worked for her father, tending the garden. Her young man kept saying that it would never work between them, that no matter how much he loved her, no matter how beautiful she was or how much he wanted to keep her with him, he could never take care of her the way she deserved."

Willow paused in her story, remembering that this was the Hellmouth, "But then he disappeared, and Julia was heartbroken. Her darling Edward had vanished, and she was certain that tragedy had befallen him, that she would never see her love again. So she prepared herself to waste away in grief."

Drusilla gave a soft sigh, her fingers tracing over the letters of Julia's name, "Dying of grief?"

"Ah, but then one night, as Julia was alone in her room, she heard a noise outside her window. Looking outside, who did she see but her darling Edward! True, he looked a bit pale, but she would know him anywhere. So Julia opened the window and went outside to give Edward a big hug, and to ask where he'd been, why he had left her alone. His lips were cool as he gave her a kiss and said that he'd found a way, a way that they could be together… together forever. Then his eyes turned yellow, and his teeth were sharp, and he bit her! Her family was very upset, and they buried her, and a few nights later, Edward came to meet her, standing right where you are now, and after she'd clawed her way out of the ground, they left Sunnydale forever, together." Willow gave a small smile, hoping that Drusilla would appreciate some of the little touches that she'd gathered from reading books about how to tell a story.

"Oh, how splendid! You're very good at this game," Drusilla beamed at Willow. "Now, let's see… Jean P. DeFontelle? Is that a man or a woman? Hmmm…."

………………………………..

Angelus carried the struggling Mrs. Rosenberg into the mansion on Crawford Street. So far, he hadn't been able to decide on the best way to dispose of her body after her inevitable death, but his spoken out loud thoughts on the matter had driven the woman into a state of terror. She'd made a few noises at several points, as if preparing to scream, which he'd stopped with the casual mention of ripping out the intestines of any would-be rescuers and using those intestines as ropes to bind her with. Not that he had any intention of doing so, but it made a graphic threat. Intestines had too much give to be a proper form of restraint for a prisoner anyhow.

He decided on the bedroom that had been painted pale green, with bare wooden floors and the sort of boring pale draperies that suggested either a guest room or someone who was exceedingly dull. It had been furnished with a nice bed with a wrought iron headboard, and he tossed her on the bed. A few moments by the dresser yielded a pair of handcuffs, and it was simplicity itself to cuff her wrists to the headboard. Looking at her, he grinned, "Now that's you secured. This room should be perfect for you. I know that Willow stayed just two doors down the hall, a while ago, and said her stay was quite pleasant. Yesterday, I might have put her words down to being raised to be polite, but… Mrs. Rosenberg, you haven't been very polite tonight. That's just one of the things that you'll be sorry for."

"You can't do this… you can't just… kidnap me!" she gasped, her throat still sore from him squeezing.

"I already have," He smiled, letting his fangs drop again. "Very few people have the first idea what I am in this town. Those that do? I have them convinced that I'm not that bad. Sadly, the smartest of the bunch are someone too busy with other matters, and Willow. She trusts me, trusts her good friend Angel."

"She'll see through you."

"No, Sheila… you don't mind if I call you Sheila, do you? We're going to get to know each other very well before your untimely demise. Willow doesn't have very many friends. I'm starting to think that's because of you, now that I've met you. But she doesn't have many friends. You don't like any of them. We don't much care for you either," He gave a smile that would have been much more charming without the fangs. "We'll be very busy comforting her over your disappearance, Drusilla and I. I don't even know if Buffy and Xander will know about you vanishing until you turn up dead. You didn't tell me if you preferred the beach or the woods."

"B-b-but I'm not dead."

"No, not yet. It could be weeks before you get to that point. Don't worry though, my boys and I will make sure you don't get lonely." That said, Angelus walked out of the room. The worst thing he could do to her right now would be leaving her alone to stew on the threats and promises that he'd made. Besides that, he needed to make certain a few things were in readiness… some manacles out in the main room so he could play with her in public… maybe a post to chain her to before whipping her? Would it be better to have one post, so that she could try to squirm to the sides and evade injury, or two, to hold her dangling in between?

He'd also have to be sure to tell the minions not to kill her. It would be a shame for things to end so quickly. She could be a wonderful daytime diversion… He wondered if she shared any of the mental adaptability that made Willow so useful, or Willow's tendency to jump from thought to thought. With enough pressure, a mind like that would shatter, just like he'd done with Drusilla. Though unless there were some hidden depths to Sheila Rosenberg that uncovered themselves quickly, her death would be a permanent one. He'd already decided that it would be painful.

The first batch of minions came back, some of them still spattered with blood from the drunken frat boys, reeking of fear, violence and alcohol.

"Welcome home, boys. We have a guest, and I have a few rules for her time with us," he walked towards them, still grinning. "You all remember my sweet Willow, the one I told you that you weren't to touch?"

"Yes, Master Angelus," one of the minions offered. "You said you had plans for her."

"Indeed. Her mother is in Sunnydale. Our own guest, actually. I decided to offer her a bit of hospitality after she told Willow that I'm a bad influence," he growled a little, still angry at the woman.

"Aren't you?" one of the minions muttered, before being elbowed by the one beside him.

"What sort of hospitality do we show her, Master?" asked the minion with the sharp elbows.

"I don't want her to die, and I don't want there to be any trouble identifying her when her body is found in a few weeks. I went into a lot of detail telling her some of the things that could happen, that said, I don't particularly care if you do or don't do them. I want someone to set up a post, or two in the main room. I want to be able to tie her up and beat her in front of the rest of you. I told her that some of you boys had been a long time without feminine company, and the idea seemed to frighten her. Her fear smells quite good… but none of you are to take more than a few swallows of blood from her at a time, and no more than three times a day. Remember, I don't want her to die yet," he rubbed his hands together, as he looked over them. Angelus felt fairly certain that they'd obey in this case, and not kill Sheila Rosenberg too quickly. Of course, he doubted that her stay would be enjoyable… for her.

Angelus smiled, and went to get a sketchbook and some charcoals. Strong emotion always made for good art, and someday, Willow might want to know about her mother's last days. It would be good to keep a record. The fact that it would add further pain and suffering to the woman was just a bonus.

End Dark Coffee 8: Images in the Steam


	9. Coffee and Flaws

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Willow didn't go back home until almost four in the morning. Even then, despite the fact that her mother should have been long since asleep, she moved as quietly as she could, without turning on any lights. She didn't want to see her mother for a while. Right now, she wasn't entirely sure if she ever wanted to see Sheila Rosenberg again.

When she woke, her eyes felt gummy and scratchy from not enough sleep, and she'd only managed to kick off her shoes before collapsing into bed. Everything felt a little bit stiff. She hobbled to the shower, and felt a little better afterwards, until she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror.

Her eyes were bloodshot, and the damp strands of hair falling around her face didn't really help. What they did was frame her bloodshot eyes and the bruise nicely. There was a bruise on her cheek, right over the bone.

Right where her mother had hit her.

She fought against tears as she retreated to her bedroom. She avoided looking into her mirror as she got dressed, not wanting to get another look, or a better one. Using makeup to try hiding the bruise was right out – even if she owned the right sort of makeup, she had no idea how to go about something like that. And she doubted some tinted lip gloss, a couple barely there mascaras, or an old jar of glitter-infested body powder would cover a bruise.

It was Saturday, so there was no school, even if she would have slept through most of it already. No need to try to pretend that everything was okay in front of so many people, especially when a lot of those people weren't her friends and would be alert for the smallest hint of weakness. The first sign that it would hurt and some of them would be all over it, picking and taunting and sneering….

Maybe high school was better instruction for hunting demons than she'd thought?

What to do? She wasn't about to stay home. One encounter with her mother in a mood like that was more than enough. She couldn't visit Jesse like she would have a couple years ago. Maybe Xander? Or Buffy? Drusilla and Angel would almost certainly be asleep at this hour, and she didn't think waking either one of them up because she was awake and didn't want to be alone would be a good idea. Oz was away with his Aunt Maureen this weekend, so spending time with her boyfriend was out…

She ended up at the school library, a pot of the raspberry coffee brewing in Giles' office and the computer up and online. There was a web browser opened to the Coroner's office, and another to the police department. Vampires and demons didn't stop doing things just because it was the weekend.

And when she finished with that, she could work on her geometry. Maybe get started on the big history paper due next month.

"Willow? What are you doing here on a Saturday?" The puzzlement in Giles' voice was easy to hear. "I thought teenagers hated being in school."

Willow half turned, keeping the bruise hidden from him as she pondered how to answer. She didn't want to admit that she was avoiding her mother, or to need to explain the bruise. Didn't want to admit that she had such a pitiful and limited number of friends. That half of those friends were vampires… no, that was a conversation for some other time, like the fifth of Never.

Having considered and discarded all sorts of things, Willow settled on, "Do demons and vampires take the weekends off?"

"No, not really… ah, you have that dratted machine looking at the Coroner's office? Is that quite legal?"

"I've never had the first bit of trouble accessing the Coroner's office and their info," Willow didn't quite answer his question. Part of this was because they needed to know, needed every advantage they could get to identify the demons and help get rid of them before they did something awful, like try to open the Hellmouth, or big, nasty human sacrificial rituals to empower themselves, summon nastier demons, or try to end the world. She'd never quite got the appeal of ending the world – didn't the demons live here too? What would happen to them if they ruined the whole world? Partly because she suspected that it might be less than legal – a coroner was a specialized doctor, and it was illegal to get other people's medical information from the doctors who treated them when they were alive. Wouldn't it be just as illegal to get the records from the doctor who saw them when they were dead? Then again, if it was supposed to be illegal – which she suspected it was – then they should make it a little harder to access the data.

Who would ever suspect shy Willow to be breaking the law? Computer hacking, illegally accessing data… She might only suspect about the Coroner's office, but she knew that it was illegal to access the police records. Granted, that was pretty easy too, and she'd seen some signs that she wasn't the only person browsing their files through other channels, but that didn't make it legal.

Idly, she wondered if it would be a good idea to find out who else was browsing the police files. Maybe it was important… But today wouldn't be a good day for something like that. That would be tricky, and she'd need to be alert for signs of detection. Maybe when she'd finished alternating between numb, hurt, angry and horrified at what her mother had done. Whenever that turned out to be…

The question slipped out before she could stop it, "Giles? When did you realize that your parents were human? That they could make mistakes, have big flaws? That sometimes they just… that things… you know, wouldn't work?"

"With my father, it was the argument we had over what I would be when I grew up. When I was about twelve, I told him that I wanted to be a fighter pilot. I didn't have glasses yet, or I would have known that it would be impossible," Giles chuckled, one hand reaching up to brush the arm of his glasses. "He told me that there was no chance of that, because I was a Giles. I would be a Watcher, like he was and his father before him. That my future was set when I was born."

Willow wondered what it would be like to have your path set for you in such a way. To not have to wonder what you'd be, what classes to take, how to prepare for the future. To have someone else making that choice for you, to see things cast in stone… "Big fight?"

"Very. I do believe I told him that I had no interest in surrounding myself with musty old books and needing to know seventeen different ways that a person could be eviscerated. We argued, and I spent the next four months insisting that I'd run away and become a grocer," there was a faint smile on his face as Giles thought back.

Willow didn't ask when he'd realized that his mother was flawed.

"I guess part of growing up is realizing that things aren't so simple. That some people aren't as good and perfect and wonderful as we thought," Willow then whispered, "and that maybe some others aren't as awful as we thought."

"Yes, the realization that much of life is in shades of grey rather than black and white is part of growing up," Giles admitted. "It can be quite upsetting when you make that discovery."

Willow nodded, facing the computer again. "Things used to be simple. They aren't so simple anymore. I thought I could just hate her, and now… now she's so…"

"Yes, it is good to see that you're putting aside your disagreements with Miss Chase," Giles nodded before moving towards his office. "Did you find anything that needs immediate attention?"

For a moment, Willow wondered when and how Cordelia had come into things. She'd been thinking about her baffling new friendship with Drusilla… She'd thought that vampires were bad, that made Drusilla bad. Made Drusilla an enemy, a danger, someone to avoid. Except that she didn't seem so awful. She'd far rather spend time with Dru than with Cordelia, and Cordelia was supposed to be human! But Giles didn't know that she'd been talking to Drusilla. That they'd painted each other's nails and talked about dreams and butterflies and nursery rhymes. That they'd sipped tea and Dru had peeked at the leaves, looking for glimpses of the future. That they'd sipped coffee and talked about books. Gone walking in a graveyard and made up stories about the people buried there.

She had no idea how to even begin telling him about that.

"Umm…" Willow glanced back at the police files. "A bunch of frat boys had a party last night in one of the little parks. It got crashed by some vampires. The police got called out this morning and found twelve dead bodies, and beer cans everywhere. Cross referencing with the coroner's office, they all had pretty high blood alcohol levels, trauma to the throats, and massive blood loss."

"Yes, I'll make sure to have Buffy take care of them."

Closing the browser for the police files, Willow wondered when seeing reports like that had stopped bothering her as much. She could still remember how the first time she'd looked up a vampire incident she'd been disturbed and queasy. This time… she just wondered if they would have been driving around drunk, or knocking down signs and spray painting windows and buildings. If they had been the sort of drunken jerks who hit their girlfriends. If they were really a loss or just possible future minions.

She also wondered what it said about her that it didn't bother her now. If it was still shock over her mother, if it was just not enough sleep. Or maybe it was something wrong with her. Her own flaw.

End Dark Coffee 9: Coffee and Flaws.


	10. Coffee and Dismay

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Giles sent her away from the library around three, muttering "You need to enjoy your life and your youth while it lasts. Maybe you could go do something out in the fresh air, perhaps with one of your friends."

He ignored her protests that "here was just fine" and "No, I really don't have anything better to do right now."

Willow sighed, glancing at the sky. The 'fresh air' looked like it was considering rain. Jesse was dead. Xander wouldn't be at home at this hour... possibly skateboarding, at the video arcade, or with Cordelia. She didn't know where Buffy was. Oz was away with his Aunt Maureen this weekend. It was too early to visit Angel or Dru...

"I guess I could try going home," Willow sighed. Then again, if her mother was still in the same mood as last night, she could go hang out at the Espresso Pump for a few hours until closer to dark.

... and it suddenly occurred to her that she was enjoying time with a pair of vampires more than she was her parents, and sometimes more than her living friends. "Maybe I need more friends."

Willow trudged home, with each step wishing that she wouldn't have to face her mother again, that there would be something useful that she could do instead. Not a major villain or someone trying to end the world, but just... an obscure demon, or some prophecy to research. She'd even settle for helping someone with their homework.

The house was quiet when she arrived. Her mother's car was still in the driveway, but… There was no sound of the television, no classical string quartets as her mom worked on psychological articles or poured over studies and reports. While they weren't necessary at not quite four in the afternoon, none of the lights had been turned on. Overall, things just didn't quite seem right.

Willow was immediately on edge.

She slowly opened the front door, remembering the way that she'd fled through this same door last night. How she'd fled from her mother to the side of the vampire with wobbly sanity. The couch had been moved, bumping into the coffee table. Several of the portraits on the wall had fallen. Her first suspicion was that something very bad had happened. But vampires had to be invited in… Not that vampires were the only dangers. Hundreds of different types of demons. Human on human violence. The details felt very sharp as she walked around, uncertain what she'd see behind the couch.

The picture of her parents at their wedding had fallen to the floor, the glass barely remaining in the frame instead of spilling out. The first family portrait, with her mother smiling at her father, and herself as a tiny baby with scattered tufts of red hair had also fallen, with the frame popping open and the picture half out. Her kindergarten picture and her mother's college graduation pictures were at crazy angles. There was also a large dent in the wall. But no broken, stiffened body, no large bloodstains. No bloodstains at all.

The phone was against her ear and ringing before she realized that she had even moved. In moments, Willow found herself trying to talk to a very unsympathetic police officer. She explained that she'd come home and her mother was gone, car still in the driveway. That some things were disturbed… more like a fight than a robbery. No, Officer, there were no bodies, bloodstains, or bullet holes that she'd seen. It didn't look like anything was stolen. With only a token effort at courtesy and less at sympathy, she was informed that her mother had to be gone for over twenty-four hours before she could file a missing persons report. Even then, her mother could have simply left to attend to some sort of personal matter, so forty-eight hours with no contact would be better Had she tried calling her mother's cell phone?

Willow had no idea if she'd even said goodbye, or who had hung up first. She wasn't entirely sure if it mattered. Something bad had happened to her mother right here in the house.

Bad things weren't supposed to happen in your house.

Cemeteries were classic places of bad things. Dark alleys and abandoned factories were also high on the list of 'where bad things happen'. The school built on top of the Hellmouth was a promising choice for doom and dismemberment. Hospitals were the places where bad things finished, or sometimes you recovered, at least partially, from the bad things. Bad things happened on or beside the roads. But your house was supposed to be a safe place.

Not that it had felt very safe last night.

Willow picked up a jacket, and grabbed some spare money from the cookie jar. As she did, it occurred to her that nothing was out of place more than usual in the kitchen. A brief check revealed that all the electronics were still there. So was her mom's jewelry. What had happened wasn't a robbery.

Before she left for the Espresso Pump, Willow made certain that all of the doors were carefully locked. She didn't want to think about her mother or the house for a while. Instead, she wound up at the Espresso Pump, in a seat where she could watch out the window and just watch the people. Watch them go about their lives, oblivious to the monsters that lurked. Monsters with fangs and claws and justifications and anger management and ways of twisting things up so that their victims thought it was their own fault… You couldn't trust all the people. A lot of them were sheep, but some were monsters.

Willow didn't want to be an oblivious little lamb. But becoming a monster didn't appeal much either. There were always people willing to kill monsters, and sooner or later, someone generally succeeded.

For now, the safest thing to do would be to wait and see if her mother called or came back. While waiting, she would try to be on guard in case whatever bad thing that happened to her mom came back. She would need to improve her skills, to have a hope of being able to defend herself when she encountered the next bad thing – and there was always a 'next bad thing', especially in Sunnydale.

She figured that Dru would be willing to help her learn more and maybe practice with magic. Maybe Angel could help her learn a little about fighting… and why oh why hadn't Giles or Buffy thought to teach her even a little bit? Granted that it made sense why she wasn't being taught everything a Slayer would know, but maybe just a little, enough that she could actually be helpful on patrol instead of an endangered set of eyes?

Sipping a cup of coffee and debating if she really wanted to ask Dru for help with magic just yet, Willow came to a disturbing realization. At least part of her was considering her mother to have become a bad thing. Her mother that had yelled at her, insulting her studies, her reading, her friends… had slapped her. All what Sheila Rosenberg's own research and papers described as classic abusive behavior. Her mother had been a threat last night, and could easily do it again. She would have to be prepared to defend herself against her mother… It might be easier to fight and slay a vampire.

But Willow was never one to turn away from something just because it would be hard.

End Dark Coffee 10: Coffee and Dismay


	11. Dark Visions

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Drusilla had woke to the sounds of screaming. Not her own screams, from the twisted memories and ugly dreams of people with familiar faces tearing her to pieces, her family scattered on the floor like broken dolls. Not the screams of her sweet William, even if he did want to be called Spike now. Looking over at the rows of pretty dolls, she asked, "Miss Edith, who is screaming, and were they very naughty?"

Miss Edith's eyes gleamed in the darkness. The little tree's mum had been very, very naughty. Angel-daddy had decided to punish her for hurting the little-tree, and so the silly boys were playing with her for now. Little tree's mum didn't like the games of the silly boys.

"No, oh please no! Not my shirt!"

Drusilla shook her head, sliding out from between her silken sheets, which were covered over with a lacey comforter, stuffed with down feathers. Naked, she shuffled over to the chair in front of the capricious mirror and began to brush her hair. The mirror was still cross with her and refused to let her see herself within its silvery pane. "Mirror mirror on the wall... where is our little tree?"

For a moment, instead of seeing the backs of her pretty dolls and her lovely room, she saw a wooden table. On the table was a white mug, half full of coffee, bearing red letters proclaiming Espresso Pump. Drusilla barely had time to read the letters before the image hid, showing only that her naughty little Amanda doll was trying to untie herself.

When it was dark, she'd have to drop by and visit the little tree. Perhaps little tree could remember which coffee tasted of almonds and secrets.

"Don't touch me!"

The crack of a cold hand on hot flesh stopped the naughty woman's shrieking. There was the lower growl of one of the boys talking to the naughty woman, but Drusilla couldn't separate the words.

Drusilla brushed away all the tangles in her hair, though she couldn't see it in the mirror. Another fifty strokes for shine, and then she twisted it up on her head, pinning it into place with the long sharp pins. A naughty girl had once stabbed her with pins like these, long ago when a woman named Victoria ruled supreme and the sun never set on the Empire. Nasty sun, always following them like that.

Humming a fragment of a song that she couldn't remember the name of, Drusilla walked to her wardrobe, opening it to show her pretty dresses. Her fingers brushed over fuzzy velvet, slick silk that fell over her skin like water, her nails catching on delicate lace. Dresses as silver as the moon, red as blood, purple and blue like wildflowers and bruises, black as shadows and the same lovely blue-green of a peacock's fancy tail. "So many pretty dresses, which one do I wear tonight?"

After a few moments, Drusilla pulled out a velvet gown the color of a bruise. Little tree might appreciate the symbolism. They had been talking about it in books.

Miss Nancy whispered at her, repeating Angel-daddy's rules. No hitting little tree. No using nasty spells on the little tree. No talking about naked games with little tree. Remember that little tree is still fragile.

A chuckle from Miss Edith caught her attention. Angel-daddy said not to cast nasty spells on little tree. He didn't say that she couldn't teach the little tree to cast her own nasty spells on naughty people. Like that awful yellow haired girl who tried to take her angel-daddy away from her.

"Do you think that she'd like to learn? The glowy lights, the dancing fairies, the biting spells… they scare some people," Drusilla asked Miss Edith. "Little tree is shy."

Then start with little magics, harmless magics. Start with things that won't frighten the little tree. When she learns those, then move to something more challenging, more dangerous. Miss Edith seemed to smile at Drusilla. Ask the little tree if there's a way to combine coffee and chocolate… mmm… chocolate…

"No! I – I'm a married woman! I have a daughter! Don't! Don't!"

Drusilla glanced towards the screaming. "Naughty woman. You are a terrible mother, and Angel-daddy said that they could hurt you. Just accept your punishment."

She listened to the silly boys play with the naughty woman for a little over an hour before it was dark enough for her to go outside. During that hour, she had concluded that the mirror was still cross at her, little tree's mum had a very naughty mouth, and it might be best not to talk to the little tree about what was happening to her mum. And Miss Edith wanted her to ask about chocolate and coffee combined.

Halfway down Crawford Street, a very rude man tried to drag her into a van, intent on pawing at her body. He wanted to play naughty naked games, and put his little sausage between her legs. The only thing to do was to drink him down like a big shiny packet of coffee like the brave men who were thrown to the moon would have. She wanted to find one of those men one night, to ask if they had heard the stars sing when they'd ventured into their parlor. Once she'd finished with him, she left the rude man in his van and kept walking.

If she dawdled too much, the little tree might leave the coffee place. That would be a shame.

The little tree was still there, her ember-bright hair visible through the window. Smiling, Drusilla entered the building, going right to the little tree's table. There was even a second chair at the table, perfect for her to sit in! "Little tree, I was hoping to find you."

Little tree smiled, though her eyes were still sad and shimmered with hidden tears. Her cheek was turning blue and purple from the bruise, which didn't quite match her dress. One hand held the mug of coffee, which smelled of cinnamon. "Drusilla. That's a very pretty dress. How has your evening been?"

"The silly boys were playing and woke me up," she sighed. "Since they were so noisy, I thought that I'd come out and see if you were busy. Miss Edith was wondering if you'd like to learn a few magic tricks. Little magics. Safe magics."

"That might be fun. Was there anything else Miss Edith suggested?" her head tilted a little, and questions were spinning and dancing behind her lips and eyes.

"Miss Edith wanted me to ask you if there was a way to combine coffee and chocolate," Drusilla admitted, before wrinkling her nose and whispering, "I tried that and the chocolate just melted at the bottom of the cup and made a mess."

"Oh," little tree paused, one finger circling the rim of her cup. "There are two ways, but I'm not sure if the first will work for you, considering your diet."

With the little pout that had always made her William sigh and give in to her whims, Drusilla asked, "Why not?"

"The one that I know you could try is a mocha. They don't use the sort of chocolate that you eat, I think they use the cocoa powder. Very yummy, especially with the whipped cream and sprinkles over the top. We can get you one here, if you'd like. The other way is chocolate covered coffee beans. If you go to the right place – and I don't know all those places – you can get chocolate covered anything," Little tree explained.

"One of those poke a mochas sounds lovely," Drusilla smiled.

Drusilla followed the little tree to the counter, where little tree ordered a mocha, a slice of chocolate torte, and another cup of cinnamon coffee. While little tree wasn't looking, Drusilla picked up another fork, hoping that she could talk little tree into giving her a taste of the pretty chocolate cake, and some napkins, even if they were fragile papery wisps instead of good linen.

The mocha was delicious. Drusilla did manage to talk little tree into sharing the yummy cake, which went wonderfully with the coffee. "I can teach you a few tricks, but we'll need to go somewhere quiet. Maybe one of the lovely cemeteries?"

Little tree shook her head, "Bad idea. I'm pretty sure that Buffy's doing cemetery rounds tonight, and that would just… let's not run into her, okay?"

Drusilla hissed at the thought of the blonde Slayer that had twisted her Angel-daddy into knots. "If I see her, can I claw her eyes out?"

Little tree sighed, "Drusilla, if you and Buffy get into a fight, it might ruin your pretty dress."

"But I like this dress. My Spike thinks it looks lovely on me, and better in a pool of velvet on the floor," Drusilla protested. What manner of uncivilized wench was this Slayer to ruin pretty dresses like that? Bad enough that the blonde ran about in something like a child's shift, or tight trousers… She didn't understand how the little tree could stand someone like that.

"Maybe one of the parks? Most people avoid them after dark, and those that don't will be noisy enough to avoid." Little tree offered, sweeping the few crumbs together with one of the flimsy paper napkins.

Leaving the coffee house, Drusilla walked with the little tree to one of the parks, still holding some of the flimsy paper napkins. While they were terrible napkins, they could work as tools to practice with, tools that could be ruined without anyone being sad. "Little tree, what do you already know about magic?"

"Just a little. I can float a pencil, and I helped Giles make a potion to detect a witch," she sighed, her shoulders drooping. "I'm good on a bit more theory, and I tried the candle-lighting spell in your book. I managed to light one of the tiny candles, like for birthday cakes. But I accidentally melted five before that."

Drusilla blinked, deciding to stick with little things that couldn't accidentally hurt either of them. "Perhaps we should start with how to feel the magic around us? And meditation."

Entering the park, Drusilla sat on one of the swings, gesturing for the little tree to sit on another one. "Close your eyes, let the night whisper in your ear, feel the shadow caress your skin. Breathe and smell the grass, the little yellow flowers and the trees, the hint of the ocean. Let all of that flow around and through you."

Little tree relaxed, her hands slipping down the chains of the swing. "I feel… something around me. It's not the wind… its warm?"

"Oh yes, that's the magic! All warm and cozy, like a feathery blanket. Let it wrap around you, fill you…" Drusilla clapped as the little tree described the feeling of the magic. "In some places, it feels weaker, like a feather or a bit of lace. The magic is strong here, and it can help you become strong too."

Drusilla smiled as the little tree nodded. The magic would help her grow strong, help her understand how the world really worked. She would teach her so many splendid things… Angel-daddy would be pleased that she was helping the little tree be safer, stronger.

The magic here would help the little tree grow into a mighty tree, perfect to be part of their family.

End Dark Coffee 11: Dark Visions.


	12. Brewing Darkness

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Willow had called the police station again on Monday morning, to make the official report that her mother was missing. She was vaguely aware that in other places, such a report needed to be made in person at the station. But that was in places that didn't have a Hellmouth-inspired turnover rate. Places where there weren't obituaries in the school paper, places where the usual cause for a job opening was the last person died.

The officer had been much better to talk to than the one Saturday. While this one didn't sound real-sympathetic, the polite fake-sympathy was there, and there were no nasty insinuations that she was either playing some sort of prank or responsible for the disappearance herself. This person agreed that with the car and purse still in the house and the lack of stolen valuables, it did sound suspicious that she hadn't been seen since Friday night. The officer had sighed and said that a report like this was usually the other way around - with the teenager storming off in a fit of temper and not being seen again, rather than the parent. The officer had suggested that she contact any other friends or relatives that her mother could have been in touch with, just in case.

Thanking the officer for his time, Willow had hung up. The officer hadn't actually said it, but it was obvious to her that the officer had already written her mother off as probably dead of Sunnydale nightlife. She'd called some of the people in her mother's cell phone contacts directory, claiming that 'Sheila Rosenberg forgot her cell phone, if she gets in contact with you, please let her know that it's back in Sunnydale.'

Willow didn't give her mother a strong chance of being alive and well. She'd left without identification, money, credit cards, or weapons, on foot in Sunnydale at night. It was a bad combination.

Honestly, she wouldn't be surprised to find her mother wandering around next week with fangs, psychoanalysing people before she killed them. As if Sunnydale after dark wasn't bad enough.

"Hey, Willow. You look distracted today," Xander called.

"Mmmm," She waved at him, staring at her toes.

"We don't have a test today, do we? Please tell me today isn't that big geometry test worth a third of our grade? Or the thesis for English - I haven't even started on the final version, that thesis can't be due today," Xander started to panic, his fingers tugging at the hem of the green and yellow Hawaiian print shirt that he had on today.

Looking up, Willow gave a half smile, "No, the thesis paper is due next week, so you still have six days to get it done. The big geometry test is Wednesday."

Xander's eyes got wide as he whispered, "There's a bruise on your face..."

Willow sighed, "yeah. I... my mom... we had an argument."

"That's the sort of argument my parents have with each other. Has she hit you before? Do you need a place to stay? Did she apologize?" One hand was on her shoulder, and the other looked as if he wanted to touch the bruise but wasn't certain if it would hurt too much.

"After the argument, I sort of... stormed out for a bit. I thought she'd just gone to bed before I went home. But I haven't seen her since then. That was Friday," Willow admitted.

"Did she... where would she have gone?" Xander asked, tugging her towards her locker.

Willow shrugged, "She left her purse, and the car's still there. That's why I didn't think anything was up when I went home. I called to report her missing this morning."

"She's been gone all weekend? And nobody's heard anything?" Xander shook his head, "In Sunnydale? Wills..."

"I called some of the names in her cell phone directory. They hadn't been in touch with her," Willow paused. "I sort of left them thinking I was her secretary or something. Except for Dad and Aunt Esther, but neither of them have heard from her either."

"What did you tell them? The people you called, I mean?" Xander asked. "Are you okay?"

"I told them that she'd forgot her cell phone," Willow sighed, leaning against her locker instead of opening it. "Am I okay? I don't know. She hit me, Xander. Years of papers and lectures and reports about how violence is never the answer, about how that's abuse and shouldn't be tolerated... and she hit me. Because she didn't like a book I was reading."

"Something from the library? Some of those are kind of..." Xander faltered. "Still not that bad."

"I don't know how I feel about that," Willow whispered. "But I already figured out that I'm not likely to see her alive again."

Willow still wasn't certain how she felt about that either. It didn't feel quite real.

"And what's the matter over in the unpopular corner?"

Cordelia's tone wasn't as mocking at it would have been before Cordelia and Xander had started dating, though Willow still didn't understand what black magic had caused such unnatural behavior. Though maybe a very powerful spell… a lust spell? Maybe a love spell… obviously not a direct mind-control…. And she was over-analyzing. Turning to face Cordelia, she offered, "My mom disappeared Friday. Haven't seen her all weekend. She's probably dead now. How was your weekend?"

"Wha… Your mom's been gone all weekend? Are you sure she didn't just leave again?" Cordelia blinked, then settled her sneer back into place, "It isn't like she isn't going away all the time already."

"Without her purse or the car?" Willow arched her eyebrow. "No, it wasn't another business trip. Something's wrong, and if I see her again chances are good that we'll need to stake her. I've already reported her missing to the police. This is Sunnydale, and it was already dark."

It wasn't as if her mother's disappearance could be hidden forever. Not as if Cordelia and her sheep wouldn't find out. If she remembered right, Tami's dad was on the police force, which meant that Tami might already know. There weren't that many people named Rosenberg in the county.

Willow seemed to drift through the rest of the day, only brought back to focus when Buffy burst into the library. "Willow, your mom… I heard some rumors. What happened?"

"Buffy. How'd your French test go?" Willow murmured.

"Yikes, that's quite the bruise, what happened? And why are there rumors about your mom?" Buffy's hands were on her shoulders, fingers digging in just a little.

Willow could imagine Drusilla's voice, murmuring that a proper lady would not grab her friend like that, and the nasty Slayer might be leaving bruises on her arms. Or perhaps she would say that it was not polite to admit to listening to rumors and gossip… "The bruise… there was a fight. I got hit in the face."

"At least you got away. What sort of demon was it, point me in the right direction and I'll Slay," Buffy looked worried.

"My mother. I left after that, and didn't get back home until late. I thought she'd already gone to sleep," Willow shook her head, "But she's not there. Her purse was there, the car's there. Mom isn't."

"Your mom hit you?" Buffy gasped.

"Wait, she was in the house when you last saw her? But… but that means…" Xander stammered

"It might still have been a demon. Demons don't need invitations. But it wasn't a thief. And she didn't take the car. She could have left for a walk to clear her mind," Willow didn't mention the dent on the wall or the pictures that had been out of place, or the one on the floor, the glass broken. "As I said, I've already reported her missing."

Willow found herself held in a Slayer-strong hug as Buffy mumbled things about it would be okay, and they were there for her. As she remembered the fight, remembered how unfair her mother's accusations had been, remembered the anger in Sheila Rosenberg's eyes, Willow could feel herself shaking. Not out of grief but anger. Her mother had mocked the book, called it nonsense and a waste of time, given not the first hint of the respect for alternate choices and beliefs that she had always insisted Willow use for others. Remembered the way that her mother, the one who always talked about rational discussion and compromise, hadn't even been willing to listen. How her mother had hit her.

Finally, Willow knew something about how she felt. It bothered her that her friends were more upset that her mother was gone than she was. It made her angry how her mother had attacked her and her reading, how her mother had hit her. And she wasn't certain that she would be physically strong enough to stake her mother if she'd become a vampire.

Most disturbing was the little part of her that hoped to see Buffy stake Sheila Rosenberg. To watch her mother's body crumble to ashes. To see her die.

End Dark Coffee 12: Brewing Darkness.


	13. In the Park

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The house had been intolerable for Willow. Maybe it was the dent in the living room wall, or the cracked pictures that seemed to taunt her about her mother, reminding her of that fight, of the horrible things that could happen in Sunnydale. She wasn't sure if it was too stuffy, or too quiet, but she couldn't stay inside and focus on her homework. In frustration, she shoved everything into her backpack and made her way to one of the parks. Setting up her things at one of the picnic tables, she finally settled into her homework.

Her mind took a strange sort of comfort in the sounds of children playing, of birds in the sky, the wind in the leaves, and the warm sunshine of her skin. Willow zipped through the assignments for her math class, finishing those for this week and several others that weren't due until later in the month. She outlined and planned papers for English class, discussing characters and plots and symbolism, as well as planning out one on the life and career of a classic British author. She reviewed notes for History, her time researching with Giles letting her sort out where terrible tragedies had been caused by vampires and demons instead of rampaging soldiers, and where demons and dark magic had assisted plagues and famines. Time became meaningless for Willow.

"Were the little lambs playing and laughing?"

Willow blinked in surprise. How could Drusilla be in the park?

Glancing around, she realized that it had grown dark. The children had gone home, the sun had gone down, and she hadn't noticed because she was right under a lamp post. Just over there was a smiling Drusilla, clad in a peacock green dress, her arm looped over the arm of Spike, who looked much less friendly.

As she mentally called herself an idiot, Willow tried to smile at Drusilla. "They were, and there was a softball game earlier. Did you talk Spike into playing the cemetery game with you tonight?"

Drusilla pouted, "My Spike does not care for the cemetery game. He would rather be the one who caused them to need a funeral, and that takes away all the mystery."

"Oh," Willow shivered. Spike - William the Bloody - of course he'd rather kill people. And she was alone in the park except for Drusilla and Spike, and neither one of them were precisely safe... Why oh why had Angel decided to try to reconnect with his evil children? Why wasn't she trying to run away? "Should I ask what sort of things the two of you had planned for tonight?"

Drusilla let go of Spike's arm, and twirled, arms outflung, "Tonight is a lovely night! The stars are singing, the ocean is pretty and sings a happy song of silver fish and green eels, and the golden sands are too wet to run away. I wanted to have my Spike meet you, little tree."

"You did?" Willow blinked, wondering if this was about to become a very painful and unpleasant night for her. Turning to face Spike, she tried to smile as she offered a weak sounding "ummm... Hello?"

"Angel-Daddy said that we had to play nice with you, little tree. No biting, no hitting, no killing you. Not either one of us," Drusilla's spinning stopped, leaving her to lean against the table. "Oh, now the world is spinning..."

Spike pulled out a cigarette and lit it, taking a puff before he growled, "Angelus said he wants to keep you around. Dru seems to like you too, though if you play that silly game with her that might explain a bit."

"Be nice to little tree, she's going to be my little sister," Drusilla hissed, her eyes changing to yellow.

"Angel and I usually meet for coffee on Wednesdays," Willow whispered. She wanted to believe that it was force of habit that caused Spike to call him Angelus. That it only made sense that the halfway sane evil vampire would use the name that Angel had used when he was evil, when he'd made Spike a vampire. That Angel was still her friend, still a good guy.

That she was still safe with him.

Drusilla reached over, her cool fingers tracing the bruise on Willow's cheek. "Poor little tree. Only bruises and harsh words, no praise, no gentleness, no rewards. I can see why Daddy is not pleased with your family."

"You can't choose the family that you're born to," Willow looked up, meeting Drusilla's eyes. The yellow color didn't frighten her any more than seeing her with dark eyes. Perhaps that should worry her, should be a sign that something had gone terribly off-kilter in her life. "Did you want someone to play the cemetery stories game with you again tonight?"

"Not born to the first time, but you can choose a second family, of different blood," Drusilla whispered. "Though sometimes that family chooses you and not the other way 'round."

"Dru," Spike's voice carried a warning that Willow couldn't decipher.

"Sometimes I used to wonder what it would be like if I wasn't an only child," Willow admitted. She tried to ignore the fact that to vampires, family generally meant turning. Angel had told them no biting and no killing... that ruled out turning her into a vampire. If they actually listened to him...

Spike's grin was about as toothy as possible without actually going into game-face and having fangs. "One night, Red. Not tonight - Angelus doesn't want anybody else laying a tooth on you. If anyone turns you, it'll be him. But I think he's got plans for you."

Part of Willow wanted to believe that Angel would only say something like that as a story to keep her safer, that he wouldn't really try to turn her. Angel was a good guy, he didn't do things like that. Another part of her wondered, and worried. There had been so many things lately... "I don't know that I'd make a very good vampire. I'm shy, and I don't know how to fight, and... and I spend time with the Slayer. Wouldn't I make a terrible vampire?"

"Slayers don't last that long, ducks. She'll be gone soon enough, and maybe by that time, you'll be ready to bring into the family," Spike made a smoke ring. "We've got time."

"We shall start you in your magic first, while you can still dance and read the sunshine," Drusilla moved to sit beside Willow. "It is so vexing to find a teacher when you can only go about at night."

"I'd like to learn more magic," Willow tried not to think about them bringing her into the family in a more permanent fashion. A tiny part of her wanted to find Angel, to have him tell her that it was all a ruse, just a way to keep his evil children in line. "And I'm trying to finish school."

"There's a lot of dangerous things running around this place. Maybe we should make sure you get back home, back inside where nobody'll try to eat you?" Spike perched on the table on her other side, his hand reaching over to play with a lock of her hair. "Nobody's think you look like a vampire. Not too sure you look like a witch."

"I'm not much of a witch yet. Though I'm a fairly good hacker... computer hacker, that is," Willow was feeling a bit uneasy, between the two vampires, both of whom seemed to want to touch her.

Drusilla slid her arm around Willow, giggling, "But you will learn. The stars will sing about you, and you will be my favorite little sister, and we shall tell each other stories and whisper secrets."

"Time to take Red back to her house, Dru. It isn't time for her to come stay with us yet," Spike gathered up the books, dropping them into Willow's bag. It was an unexpectedly helpful gesture.

"Are you sure? I like my little tree. We can keep her even if she is all warm," Drusilla pouted at Spike.

Spike's voice was firm, "Angelus said not yet."

Willow found herself escorted back to her house by the pair of vampires, absently chatting about some of the demons that had been in town recently. A pack of ghouls scurrying around in the woods near the Elementary school and San Jose cemetery. Something big and orange and feathery that had been lurking in the empty warehouse district. "… and there's that pair of lamprey demons that Buffy saw on the beach."

"Bloody nasty things, those," Spike growled.

"Breath like rotting fish and no respect for the stars," Drusilla sniffed. "How does one make them go away?"

Willow smiled at Dru, and then glanced at Spike, "According to the books, blunt impacts across the bones are really effective, fire works well but probably wouldn't be your choice of weapon. Some hunters in the Caribbean found that sharp bits to the joints can take them down, but then there's lots of screaming and kind of greenish blood that would stain up Drusilla's pretty dresses something awful."

"Bloodstains are hard enough to make go away when they're red," Drusilla shook her head. "But green? I think not."

Spike just grinned, "I'll have to try that if I can catch the buggers."

"Oh, here we are at your house, little tree," Drusilla hugged her, placing a cool kiss over the bruise on her cheek. "Dream of dancing fairies and sweet songs, and do not listen to Miss Pamela. She is quite jealous and might lead you astray."

Spike just leaned over and caught her lips in a kiss before giving a wicked grin and saying, "Can't wait till you're ours."

As Willow closed the door behind her, she felt like her head was spinning. Spike had kissed her. Drusilla had hugged her, saying that she would become her favorite sister. They both seemed to think it was only a matter of time before she was part of their family. That Angel would turn her into a vampire.

She wondered if she'd be able to convince herself that they were mistaken. Or if she was the one who'd made a mistake somewhere along the line. But things were changing, and she suspected that the changes were only just beginning.

end Dark Coffee 13: In the Park.


	14. A Darker Roast

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Angelus looked up as his favorite children wandered into the room. He was in the middle of making another sketch of Sheila, who was currently shackled to the posts in the middle of the room, her shirt in bloody tatters after she'd been whipped. Some of the minions were lurking around, leering at her and making comments. They wouldn't touch her any further in the great room, not without his permission, but Sheila didn't know that.

"Why the pictures, Angelus?" Spike's voice held no mocking, no contempt, only a bit of curiosity.

"Because Angel-Daddy doesn't like the cemetery game either," Dru sniffed.

"That woman is Red's mother. Someday, Willow might want a record of her mother's final days," Angelus paused, smirking over at his captive. "Sheila, have you given any more thought to where you'd like your body to be found? The beach, the woods, perhaps left in a cemetery? Sunnydale has all sorts of options to chose from."

"Does she get to chose?" Dru leaned closer, her eyes wide.

Angelus knew that if he could see his expression, it would be full of cruel amusement. "Maybe. But it upsets her when I ask where she wants her body to be found. When I talk about her as if she's already dead. And it really upsets her when I talk about comforting Willow after she learns of her mother's terrible death."

Spike turned to look at Sheila, his expression thoughtful. "I suppose I can see the resemblance. Red does look a bit like her, except she's still all sweet and innocent."

"You saw Willow?" Angelus wasn't certain he liked that idea. Willow was his friend... no, his project. He was a vampire, and vampires didn't have friends. Not soulless vampires. Even if that friend was... Willow was Angel's friend, she wouldn't want to still be his friend if she knew that the soul was gone, knew that he was eating people, had her mother held prisoner. And he didn't like the way that idea bothered him.

"We found the Little Tree in a park, and said hello. I told her that you told us to play nice," Dru smiled. "Are you sure that we can't keep her here with us?"

"Didn't hurt the chit," Spike mumbled. "She does look like a tasty morsel, but I can... alright, I'm an impatient vampire, but I didn't hurt her."

"It isn't time for her to be here yet, Dru. Sheila has to be dead first, and Willow isn't quite ready to move in with us. To be among so many vampires. She'd be afraid, and some of the minions wouldn't be able to behave." Angelus shook his head. "Not yet. We might also consider her wolf."

"Do we keep him, or kill him for being a naughty puppy?" Dru asked, her head tilted to the side.

"Good question. I think we need to watch him a while before we decide that. If we keep him, he could be a good way to persuade her to our side. If we decide not to keep him, we can always kill him later," Angelus declared.

"So someone should keep an eye on wolf-boy then." Spike pulled a cigarette out and lit up. Blowing a puff of smoke, he glanced at Angelus, "What does the wolf do other than talk to Red?"

"He's got a band. Something with Dingoes in the name," Angelus offered, not having paid too much attention to the details of Oz. "Why don't you go watch, and maybe you can figure out if the band has potential. It isn't quite my style of music."

Spike grinned, "Fair enough. Guess I'm off to stalk a werewolf then."

Angelus blinked, wondering why Spike was in such a hurry to leave. "He seems to be in a hurry."

"My Spike is afraid that you'll be angry at him," Dru giggled. "Shall I go tell that woman how she is a terrible mother, and then thank her for giving us the Little Tree? She would not be so willing to talk to us if that woman didn't make her feel so alone."

"Just why does Spike think I'd be angry with him now?" Angelus caught Dru's arm, preventing her from going to taunt Sheila.

"Well…" Dru glanced at her skirts, then peeked at him through her lashes. "He only meant to make her blush, and to confuse her a bit."

"What did he do?" Angelus demanded.

"My Spike kissed the Little Tree. It was only a little kiss, and he didn't do anything else to her. No delightful, naughty, naked games, no bleeding, no screaming… but she did turn a delightful pink!" Dru sighed. "Don't be mad at my Spike. He didn't hurt the Little Tree."

For a moment, Angelus felt a burning anger that Spike had dared to do something that he hadn't – kiss Willow. But Drusilla said it was only a little kiss, and that there hadn't been anything else, and that it had been mostly to make her blush. She had such an appealing blush. "I'm not amused. She still thinks that I'm all… soul-filled and nice."

Drusilla made a sour expression, "ick. All sad and brooding and no fun? When will you let her know otherwise?"

"Not until she won't run from me. She's…" Angelus tried to find the right words for what Willow had become. She was still mortal, so 'family' wasn't quite right, and vampires didn't have friends. Frustrated, he settled for "She's mine."

"She just doesn't understand that yet," Dru nodded. "Don't worry, Angel-Daddy. I'll do what I can to help Little Tree become the best little sister ever."

Angelus nodded, certain that Drusilla wanted Willow in the family. That Dru liked Willow. He was less certain that Dru knew how to act with someone who was still mortal and terribly shy, and very… good, rather sheltered even. "That's right, Dru. She doesn't understand yet that she's mine, that she will be part of my… our family. She doesn't understand yet what that means, and she'd be frightened if we tried to tell her now. When we've sorted out what to do with Sheila's body, we'll kill Sheila and dispose of her remains, and comfort Willow about her dead mother."

"That we tortured and killed," Dru murmured, grinning wickedly at Sheila.

"That we tortured and killed," Angelus agreed. "She really isn't a very good parent, and we have to get rid of her before giving Willow a new family anyhow. Sheila just doesn't appreciate the realities of the world, like magic and monsters. Like Willow being someone special. Like just how much of a bad influence we can really be."

"I shall go talk to her now," Dru's fingers curved, and she giggled, "Naughty Sheila is a bad mummy."

"Dru?" Angelus spoke sternly. "Don't damage her face."

"Can I hit her cheek? Like what she did to Little Tree?" Dru begged.

"As long as it doesn't break the bone," Angelus conceded.

Angelus smirked as Drusilla went over to talk to Sheila, explaining the woman's failures as a mother, and the wasted opportunity to know and appreciate the Little Tree. How Sheila being a 'naughty, naughty woman who was too blind to see her daughter meant that they would have the Little Tree for their very own.' He began to draw another picture as Drusilla rambled on about how she really wanted to tear out Sheila's unseeing eyes and make her swallow them, or perhaps spread the jelly from her eyes on toast – wasn't that the way Americans ate their toast? With jelly?

Any fool who said that 'words would never hurt' obviously hadn't been properly tormented. Words could be amazingly effective means to hurt someone. Just look at Sheila, cringing and whimpering away from Drusilla, who hadn't even touched the woman…

Drusilla's open hand struck Sheila's cheek, causing the woman's head to snap to the side. "That is for hurting my little sister. Soon, she will be part of my family, and we shall stay up till noon giggling and painting each others' toenails as red as blood. We will whisper secrets to each other, and talk about the silly things that the men won't understand. And you will be forgotten, no more than a moldering wreck stuffed in an abandoned factory never to be turned into little cans for the kittens to devour."

Angelus chuckled, amused by his broken darling's angry words. Drusilla had definitely taken a liking to Willow. "Why don't some of you boys put Sheila back in her room. I'm going to go out for a bite. Maybe someone young and tender."

Sauntering out of the room, he considered various options. Perhaps one of the wretched, foolish cheerleaders who enjoyed tormenting his sweet Willow? Or one of the athletes who bullied her into doing their homework for them, so they could throw balls and chase the cheerleaders? Not someone too close, he wouldn't be able to keep a suitably brooding face while comforting her at the death of a friend just yet. Maybe a blond cheerleader, removing one of Willow's tormentors and killing someone very much like the way the Slayer used to be? Perfect… if he could find one. Then again, he could be flexible with this.

End Dark Coffee 14: A Darker Roast


	15. Drinking Delusion

Everyone at school had heard that her mom was missing, had been missing for several days. While most didn't really know what was going on in Sunnydale, about the vampires and demons and whatever other monsters might be lurking, they all knew that missing more than a few hours was a very, very bad thing here. A likely dead kind of bad. A few even knew, even if they'd never admit it, that dead might be better than some of the other possibilities. Sunnydale being Sunnydale, this caused a strange sort of sympathy and almost gentleness at the school.

Nobody was making pointed comments or petty taunts at her in the halls. No mocking comments about bookworms and no life when she made her way to or from the library. The teachers didn't call on her unless she raised her hand first. They didn't assign her as a tutor for any of the jocks. Xander brought her a fun-sized chocolate bar each day. Oz lurked near her at the school, occasionally giving her a hug or a small smile, an attempt to comfort without the useless words. Others did offer those useless words.

That the police would find her. That her mom would be okay. That things would get better. That things weren't so bad.

Willow knew otherwise. It was that bad, it wouldn't get better, and while the police might be the ones to find her mom's body, she doubted that anyone would see Sheila Rosenberg alive again. It left her stomach feeling tangled and heavy, and she couldn't quite sort out how she felt. Willow knew that she should feel afraid for her mother's health, worried about her safety and that something awful might... perhaps already had happened. That she should want desperately to have her mother back, safe and undamaged from the ordeal.

It just wasn't working that way. There was a little worry for her mother, but there was none of the desperate need to have her back that she had seen in movies and from others who'd had relatives disappear. Anger... a large part of that was directed towards her mother, not towards whatever or whoever had prevented her from returning. And a bit of guilt that she wasn't more upset, more desperately hopeful for her mother's safe return, more angry at the monsters out there that might have killed her mom.

At least tonight she had her regular coffee not-a-date with Angel. He was a good listener, and he wouldn't try to tell her how she should feel, or more of the empty words that 'it would all be better soon' or the lie that 'her mom would be just fine'.

When the sun set, she was ensconced at one of the smaller tables in the back of the Espresso Pump, with thick books on calculus and advanced geometry set in front of her. Part of that was an effort to distract herself from her tangled emotions, and a larger part was the puzzling fact that advanced math books seemed to work on teenagers in a manner remarkably like crosses on vampires. She was working on her fourth cup of coffee, and hoping that the rest of the night would be more bearable.

"I hope that's not all homework," Angel's familiar voice carried a bit more of his accent than normal. "I would have expected you to be long finished with that by this time anyhow."

Willow smiled at Angel, motioning towards the empty seat. "It's the weirdest thing - advanced math books work on teens kind of like crosses do on vampires. Except maybe a little less smoke and blistering, and a lot more eye rolling and mumbling. So not too much like crosses. And math books are perfectly acceptable for someone Jewish... I'm babbling again, aren't I?"

"Just a little," Angel sat down, his expression one that suggested he was holding back laughter.

Willow moved some of the books to stop blocking Angel's view. "I'm glad to see you. I know that you won't lie to be about... well..."

"What's wrong, and what do you mean about people lying?" Angel frowned.

"My mother disappeared over the weekend. I'm... I'm not sure how I feel, because it's all tangled and twisted and really confusing, but I don't really like the feeling, and people keep lying to me," Willow gave him a look that said he'd better not try to say nobody would lie in this situation.

"Who's lying and why?" Angel's eyebrows had lifted, and he sipped at his coffee.

"Almost everybody. Some are telling me that she'll be okay. That the police will find her, bring her home. That everything's going to be just fine." Willow reminded herself not to glare at Angel - this wasn't his fault. "They're lying. She won't be fine, everything won't be just fine in a few days."

"Well..." Angel sipped at his coffee, visibly searching for the right words. "From the experience of age, the tangle of emotions will... not quite go away, but it'll fade. It won't be quite as intense. That'll take time, maybe a lot of time, but it will happen."

Willow considered his words. Angel wasn't saying that everything would be okay, that her mom would be fine. He wasn't saying anything that would bring up the angry, guilty tangle that was the part of her that wasn't certain she wanted her mom to be fine. He was saying that in time, the raw emotions would blunt, fade... become less harsh and heavy and confusing. And he wasn't claiming that it would happen soon.

Willow gave him a weak smile, "Thanks, Angel."

He looked quite startled, "For what?"

"For being honest with me." Willow sipped at her coffee, and sighed. "For not lying to make me feel better about Mom. For not trying to tell me how I really feel."

Angel looked at her, brooding while he sipped at his coffee. Perhaps he was reflecting on his own memories of terrible fates, for the guilt that he felt over the things that he'd done. Perhaps he was considering the many things and people that he'd lost. Or perhaps he was just being a typical guy and unsure how to deal with an emotional female.

"It means a lot to me," Willow whispered.

"I don't know what to say." Angel shook his head, and then managed a half smile, "You're welcome?"

Willow managed a real smile, and reached over to touch his hand, "I mean it. There have only been three people who haven't lied to me about this. Oz, who's doing his quiet best to let me know that he's there, you, and Giles. Giles… he kind of stammers that Sunnydale is far from safe, he's most dismayed by the whole thing, and offers me a cup of tea before changing the subject. Not exactly helpful, but he's trying. I just… I'm sure he appreciates me helping, and he'd be terrified of the computer without either me or Ms. Calendar to handle that, but… it's not really about me with him, it's about Buffy, y' know? He kind of leaves me thinking that he's worried I'll fall apart and cry on him or something."

"What do you think he'd do if you did?" Angel had that expression that wasn't quite a smile.

"Make that clucking noise and offer me tea and a handkerchief before trying to get Oz or Buffy as soon as possible." Willow didn't even have to think about that one. "Giles seems… well, emotions really don't seem to be his thing."

"Probably part of being a proper Brit," Angel shook his head before leaning closer and whispering, "Try not to spread it around, but neither Spike or Dru were very much on showing their emotions when they were alive. For Dru, it wasn't considered proper for a well-born young lady, and Spike - he went by William back then - but he tried to put it into poetry. It didn't go well for him. Both of them are much more emotional now, and a lot less worried about being proper Brits."

Willow blinked, trying to wrap her mind around the idea of Spike writing poetry. It wasn't working. But she could see Dru as a proper young lady… "I still see some of that in Drusilla. The pretty dresses, and she's got very good posture."

"Much more emotional now though," Angel mused.

"I don't know what I'd do without you," Willow admitted. She considered the matter, and made a small confession, "I think I'm starting to like Dru. I know that it's probably not a good idea, and she's all kinds of dangerous, but… it's almost like having an older sister. One that likes spending time with me, and we can talk about silly things. And she said she would help me learn magic."

Angel smiled at that, a decidedly toothy grin, "Dru likes you as well. She's convinced that you'd be a splendid little sister, and keeps asking if she can bring you home and keep you."

Willow blinked, her mind sticking on Dru wanting to keep her. The sour panic and memory of the things written in the Watcher books made perfect sense, but the whole warm fuzzy feeling that accompanied it really didn't. "Ummm… she wants to… keep me?"

"I've been telling her that you're fragile, and that it wouldn't be a good idea," Angel assured her.

"I am fragile. Maybe we can just keep with the visiting for now," Willow murmured. "Spike thinks that it's partly because I play the cemetery game with her."

"I'm sure that helps," Angel admitted.

"What would I do without you?" Willow looked at her friend.

"Don't worry, you'll never need to figure it out," Angel smiled, and took another swallow of his coffee. "There's never been… I've never had a friend like you, Willow. I'm not letting you go."

Something about his words just seemed a bit off to Willow. As she looked across the table at her friend, she decided that it had to be the Hellmouth and the whole thing with her mom. A long-term friend was a good thing… right? Anything else was just Angel having rusty people skills, wasn't it?

"It's nice to have friends." Willow just hoped that things would get better soon.

End Dark Coffee 15: Drinking Delusion.


	16. Changing the Rules

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Willow wanted to smile and dance about when the bell rang signaling the end of the school day. She didn't dance, but did permit herself a small smile. Freedom from literary analysis and crawling through tangents and cosigns of angles. Free from going over the requirements for their big history paper - she got it already, ten to fifteen pages, double spaced and single sided, in English, typed in a twelve point font. Citations and at least five quotes from at least three sources... they'd already gone over this stuff, and they'd been given a handout with the instructions.

The rules hadn't changed. It wasn't that difficult to follow them, was it?

And there were ways to avoid the rules when you didn't want to follow them. She'd known that for years - how else did you explain her computer sneaking and hacking other than avoiding the rules and not getting caught? Though if someone had to explain it, they'd obviously learned something...

The library was occupied by a bunch of people. She vaguely recognized them, in the could name them and their interests but they weren't friends sort of way. The school's book club, full of people who liked dissecting books for symbolism and analyzing them to death, dragging the characters and plots back from the grave and then tearing them open a little more.

Stepping away from the library, Willow shook her head, "Getting morbid in my old age, aren't I?"

"With all the people in there, I can't hide in the library," Willow murmured. She wouldn't get any quiet, and the idea of looking through any of the books on magic or potential trouble with that many people around who weren't in the know? Not happening. And the very idea of checking out any of her computer sites for an advance warning with them in there...

"Computer sites... maybe I can hide in the computer lab?" Willow brightened and scurried towards the lab, trying not to look like she was up to trouble.

Willow pushed open the door to the computer lab, smiling to see the room looked empty. She ducked inside, wondering if Miss Calendar was lurking in the little office, or if she was in fact elsewhere. It could happen - teachers were allowed to have lives. All of the blinds were pulled completely down, preventing the sunlight from glaring on the computer monitors.

Willow settled at the computer in the corner, wondering if it would be better to check the sites that might warn her about trouble, or to try to do a bit of research on some of what Dru had mentioned in their magic lessons. A few moments thought brought back memories of the computer lab printer being located in the attached office, and she had no idea if it was occupied right now.

"No printing of things I shouldn't be able to access if I can't see the printer," Willow decided.

Time to get a bit of information on a few things Dru had mentioned... Willow had learned that while the internet could be used to locate information on almost anything, that information didn't always make sense without someone to actually explain a few things. On the other hand, sometimes the explanations from a real person didn't go into the background and technical details that could be really interesting. "Let's see... she talked about feeling the energies of a place. I bet I can find some information on that."

Willow happily spent hours searching the internet for information. The subject was interesting, mostly new, and nobody had been killed because of it, meaning no gruesome pictures. It was also a bit trickier to find information on ambient magical energies that didn't either turn out to be a fansite for books and movies, something advertising a book or movie, plenty of potentially interesting fanfiction, or things that rambled on and on about auras and harmony and getting in touch with nature but never made much sense. She wasn't certain if the challenge made her search frustrating or more fun.

So far, the bits that she could sort out that weren't relating to various works of fiction seemed to match up with what Drusilla had told her.

She hadn't wanted to believe that Dru would lie to her. Have to be reminded by Angel not to hurt, kill, or turn her yes… well, not so much wanted the believe those things, but didn't they sort of go with Dru being a vampire? But the Watcher's books, Giles, even Angel all agreed that Dru was… a bit off in the head. It wouldn't have been much of a stretch to think that she could have been confused.

It made the fact that someone was willing to really teach her so much better. She'd picked up a few things with the research, but there was a huge difference between picking up a few things here and there and actually being taught!

There was a sudden growling noise that made Willow jump in her chair. For several moments she franticly looked around the computer lab, terrified that some awful thing had found its way inside and was about to attack her. There was a faint gurgling and then another growl, both from her stomach. Willow felt her face flush, "Ohhh… I guess lunch was quite a while ago."

Leaving the computer lab brought the discovery that it was dark out. "Great, stay to do a little research and wind up out and about at night… brilliant. Just brilliant…"

It really didn't help that she picked up the feeling of being followed halfway down Maple Street. She had no idea what, and no proof that there was anything but her imagination and fears, but… Being in Sunnydale, she figured it would be safer to assume that she was being followed and be careful but not paralyzed by the idea. And get home quickly.

Reaching her home, Willow sighed as she unlocked the door. She'd never really liked going home to an empty house, but for now, there was no other choice. Her dad was off at a convention in Texas, and her Mom… her Mom… Willow sighed as she tried not to think about her Mom and that whole ugly mess. It was enough to say that she didn't expect to see her Mom in the house again. Ever.

There were worse things than coming home to an empty house. She didn't have it that bad, in the big picture. Though it was lonely… Glancing behind her, she thought that she saw someone standing at the corner, looking her direction. Were they watching her? Were they human?

"Kay, I've definitely got to learn some more magic. Enough that if some guy tries to drag me away, I have a chance to do something about it." Willow considered that for a moment. Floating more than pencils would be good, as would being able to do more than light a candle. Though it might also be a good idea to learn a little fighting, or at least getting out of holds and running away.

For a moment, Willow considered talking to Giles about it. Asking him for lessons in how to not be helpless if someone tried to drag her away the way someone had dragged her mother out of the house. How to not be helpless if some monster attacked when she accidentally stayed at school too late. He'd learned all this as a Watcher, and was teaching Buffy how to fight, how to kill the monsters.

Except that Giles hadn't really shown any interest in teaching her before. Not her or Xander, even if they had been trying to help Buffy. Why should she expect that to change now, just because her mother was missing?

Then she considered asking Buffy. Except that Buffy hadn't thought to help them learn how to fight yet, though she had showed them both how to use a crossbow. And while Buffy was great, one of the few friends that she'd ever had, Buffy wasn't a very patient instructor, considering the whole crossbow thing. The idea of trying to learn how to fight? Between the crossbow explanation and all the times that she'd seen Buffy knock Giles around while training… no. Just… no.

"Things can't stay the same. I'm tired of being helpless." Willow shook her head, locking the door.

Willow moved towards the kitchen, voicing the thought out loud. "I'm tired of being the helpless sidekick research girl."

As she opened a can of soup, Willow considered her options, limited though they were. She'd never be the strong fighter that Buffy was – she wasn't a Slayer. But she could learn something, more than the magic that Dru was helping her learn. Dru… Angel said that Dru wanted her as a little sister.

"Maybe Angel can help me learn?" Willow considered the idea, before deciding that it was worth a try.

Maybe the rules could change.

End Dark Coffee 16: Changing the Rules


End file.
